Political Science Research Guide: Politics and Elections Databases

Politics and Elections is an area of Political Science devoted to the study of how people seek public office and how the public chooses among the candidates for public office.  This area typically encompasses:

For journal articles related to the issues above consult:

• Canadian Reference Center
  Indexes Canadian Publications. Useful for Canadian Elections Topics.
   
• EBSCOHost Academic Search Premier
  Interdisciplinary full-text database indexing many Political Science journals. Also has indexing for Newsmagazines which makes it useful for current events.
   
• Lexis Nexis  
  Useful Resource for issues dealing with the law and elections (e.g. right to a recount, electoral districts,etc.)
  NOTE: To access Canadian Case Law, or Canadian Legal Journals from this database, you must first select International Legal - then Canadian Cases OR Canadian Law Journals.  To access Canadian Laws, select International Legal - Canadian Legislation.
   
• JSTOR
  Searchable collection of periodicals in the Humanities and Social Sciences.  Coverage is retrospective (3-5 years and older)
   
• Periodical Archive Online
  Searchable collection of periodicals in the Humanities and Social Sciences.  Coverage is retrospective (3-5 years and older)
   
• PsychInfo
  This Psychology Database will provide you with citations from journals dealing with the study of (1) human behavior and (2) game theory.
   
• Project Muse
  Searchable collection of periodicals in the Humanities and Social Sciences. 
   
• SocIndex
  Database that indexes journals in the field of Sociology. Useful for topics dealing with social groups (including political parties) as well as how individuals and groups interact.
   
• Web of Knowledge
  Interdisciplinary database that indexes the most widely respected periodicals in Academia.

For Journal Articles:

• Providng Historical Coverage of Campaigns and Elections check out:
• America: History and Life
  Useful resource for political campaigns in Canadian and U.S. History. 
   
• Historical Abstracts
  Useful tool for topics that deal with historical campaigns and elections outside of North America.
   
• Related to Political Communications, consult the section Media and Voting Behavior in the box below.
   
• About how Politicians and Parties interact with different Social Groups during Campaigns and elections, consult the section on Social Groups and Political Behavior in the box below.

Consult any of the following databases for information on Media and Voting Behavior

• PsychInfo
  This Psychology Database will provide you with citations from journals dealing human behavior and (1) the Media or (2) how people vote.
   
• SocIndex
  This Sociology Database will provide you with citations to journals dealing with the media, political orientation of various groups and voting behavior. 
   
• EBSCOHost Academic Search Premier
  Interdisciplinary full-text database indexing many Political Science and Communications Journals. It also includes indexing from News Magazines which makes it useful for Current Events.

Note:  When searching for this topic think of all related terms, place OR between them and surround them with brackets. Then combine them with records from a second record set such as:

(Media OR Television OR Radio OR Newspapers OR Blogs)

AND

(Vot* OR Elections)

If your topic deals with how different groups (Women, First Nations, etc) participate and effect political decisions, you may also wish to consult databases that cite literature related to them.  They are listed below.

• Lexis Nexis
  Useful Resource for topics dealing with the legal status of difference Social Groups.
  NOTE: To access Canadian Case Law, or Canadian Legal Journals from this database, you must first select International Legal - then Canadian Cases OR Canadian Law Journals
• Bibliography of Native North Americans Database
  Useful for topics dealing with First Nations People and Political Behavior.
   
• LGBT Life Database
  Lesbian, Gay, Bi-Sexual and Trans-Gender Studies is useful for topics dealing with Gender Orientation and Political Behavior.
   
• ATLA Religion Index
  Database that indexes journals in the field of Religion. Useful for topics dealing with Religion and Political Behavior.
   
• SocIndex
  This Sociology Database will provide you with citations to articles that deal with people in different groups and how they participate in political decisions.

After searching a Database, you may need to learn if an article cited is in a journal held by the library. 

To learn if the library owns the journal, search our Journal Titles List.

If a journal is not in our collection, you can still get the article via Inter-Library Loans.

If you are a student or faculty member at Brandon University, you can access databases from off campus.

If you are accessing the library's web site from off campus, most links on the library's web site will first take you to the Proxy Authentication Page, where you can log in with your Brandon University username and password. Once you have logged in, you will be taken to the destination of the link. You should only have to log in once per session.

To log in, you will need your Brandon University username and password - the same username and password you use to log into the Brandon University network when you're on campus. If you have not claimed your username and password or you are having trouble logging in with those, you should contact the Brandon University Help Desk (Phone 571-8500 Monday -Friday 8:30AM to 4:30PM).

For more information, see the Off-Campus Access Page