Research Guides: Country Information: Country Information Home

Websites: Country Guides

BBC Country Profiles
Country profiles hosted by BBC News.
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Full profiles provide an instant guide to history, politics and economic background of countries and territories, and background on key institutions. They also include audio and video clips from BBC archives.
CIA World Factbook
Country profiles hosted by the CIA.
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The World Factbook provides information on the history, people, government, economy, geography, communications, transportation, military, and transnational issues for 267 world entities. Our Reference tab includes: maps of the major world regions, as well as Flags of the World, a Physical Map of the World, a Political Map of the World, and a Standard Time Zones of the World map.
Department of State (U.S.) Country Information
International Statistical Agenices
Links to countries' statistical agencies. Hosted by the U.S. Census Bureau.
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Tip: If website is in a language other than English, use Google Chrome. This browser will ask if you'd like to translate foreign languages into English.
United Nations and Individual Country Statistical Yearbooks
Click on a country to see what census information they are collecting. Hosted by UW-Madison Libraries.
World Leaders
Directory and profiles of world leaders, hosted by the CIA.
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The CIA publishes and updates the online directory of Chiefs of State and Cabinet Members of Foreign Governments regularly. The directory is intended to be used primarily as a reference aid and includes as many governments of the world as is considered practical, some of them not officially recognized by the United States.

Websites: Country & Regional Analysis

Council on Foreign Relations
Foreign relations and policy information hosted by the CFR.
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The CFR is an independent, nonpartisan membership organization, think tank, and publisher dedicated to being a resource for its members, government officials, business executives, journalists, educators and students, civic and religious leaders, and other interested citizens in order to help them better understand the world and the foreign policy choices facing the United States and other countries.
Freedom House
Freedom ratings by an independent organization.
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Freedom House is an independent watchdog organization dedicated to the expansion of freedom around the world.
InfoPlease Country Profiles
Each profile contains: Geography · Maps · Flag · History · Current ruler · Area · Population · Capital · Largest cities · Languages · Ethnicity/race · Religion · Literacy rate · Economy · Government
Gallup
Public opinion polls.
Pew Research Center - International Affairs
Worldwide numbers, facts, and trends.

Websites: International Resources

Human Rights Report
The annual Country Reports on Human Rights Practices – the Human Rights Reports – cover internationally recognized individual, civil, political, and worker rights, as set forth in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other international agreements.
GlobaLex GlobaLex is a resource guide created by the Hauser Global Law School program to provide guidance to foreign laws and their legislating bodies.
NATLEX
Database of national labour, social security and related human rights legislation. Legislation can be arranged chronologically and by nation.

Specialized Library Databases

For additional databases for political science research, please visit our Political Science Research Guide.

CountryWatch This link opens in a new window
Political, business, and economic information and news about every country in the world. Includes periodical articles and statistics.
Gale eBooks This link opens in a new window
This database includes articles from reference sets such as Countries and Their Cultures, The Worldmark Encyclopedia of the Nations, Countries of the World and Their Leaders Yearbook, and Nations of the World: A Political, Economic & Business Handbook.
Global Issues (Gale in Context) This link opens in a new window
Focuses on broad issues of the 21st Century, such as war, genocide, terrorism, human rights, poverty, famine, globalization, world trade, nuclear proliferation, and global warming, as well as more specific events and topics in the news that are related to these broader issues. Includes news, global viewpoints, reference materials, country information, primary source documents, videos, statistics, and more.

News and Articles

EBSCOhost (Combined) This link opens in a new window
A combined search of a wide variety of EBSCOhost databases containing thousands of journal, magazine, and newspaper articles covering all disciplines. Includes scholarly journal articles. Includes Academic Search Premier, America: History and Life, science and medicine/health databases, psychology databases, and many more. PCC offers a brief video with instructions for using this database, and more advanced ways to improve your search,
ProQuest (combined) This link opens in a new window
A combined search of a wide variety of ProQuest databases offering full text access to articles from academic journals, newspapers, magazines and other periodicals covering a variety of subject areas. Includes ProQuest Research Library, GenderWatch, Ethnic NewsWatch, and many more databases.
US Major Dailies (ProQuest) This link opens in a new window
Newspaper articles from the Los Angeles Times, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Chicago Tribune, and Washington Post. PCC offers a brief video with instructions for using this database.

Search Tips

Tip 1: Use keywords to help narrow down your search and find relevant information more quickly.

[Your country] AND [keyword or words]

For example:

El Salvador AND elections
Chile AND health care
Turkey AND economy
Afghanistan AND foreign policy
India AND globalization

Tip 2: Use "Ctrl+F" (Windows) or "Command+F" (Mac) to quickly search webpages and documents.

News & Media Sources

Tip: Use the search boxes on these sites to find news & video related to your chosen country.

Al Jazeera Video
Video segments hosted by Al Jazeera English.
BBC Monitoring
Follows the state of international media outlets.
BBC News
Audio and video segments hosted by BBC World News.
CNN Video
Video segments hosted by CNN.
World News in English
Links to English language newspaper from around the world.
Worldwide Directory of Newspapers
Links to international, national and regional newspapers online (from Headlinespot.com)

Video Databases

Films on Demand This link opens in a new window
Over 48,000 full length programs and more than 329,000 segments on a wide variety of educational subjects. Most are closed captioned.

Brazil: Urban Planning Challenges is one example of the films available to you through the Films on Demand database. When you are off-campus your LancerPoint User ID and password is required.

Academic Video Online: AVON (Alexander Street Press) This link opens in a new window
Collection of over 70,000 videos including documentaries, interviews, performances, news programs and newsreels, field recordings, commercials, demonstrations, original and raw footage.

Country Information: Country Information Home