24 United Nations Information - Information Venues (Information Research)
Description
This article is from the Information Research FAQ, by David Novak david@spireproject.com with numerous contributions by others.
24 United Nations Information - Information Venues (Information Research)
links and more at http://spireproject.com/un.htm
"The United Nations is involved in every aspect of international life -
from peace-keeping to the environment, from children's rights to air
safety. ... The UN system generates an enormous amount of information
on some of the most pressing issues the world faces ... press releases,
video and photographic footage, publications, briefing papers, etc."
Samir Sanbar, A Guide to Information at the United Nations.
United Nations documents are a recognized authority for any number of
international issues: social, legal and political. You certainly will
not be chastised for quoting United Nations statistics. Critical to
research, the UN is a collection of almost autonomous organizations
(called organs) with occasionally overlapping responsibilities,
distinct websites, and recorded as distinct publishers. As you approach
UN information, remember this is not a monolithic organization with
clearly defined roles. All drug efforts are not coordinated by the
UNDCP and all statistical work is not undertaken by the UN Statistical
Division.
UN Internet Resources
The UN website at www.un.org is just one entry point to UN information.
Of note, it contains a searchable archive of UN press releases
stretching back to 1995, 7 days of press briefings, an archive section
and information about UN publications. The real tool to use is UNIONS
(http://www3.itu.int/unions/search.cgi), a meta-search engine for many
of the larger UN organ websites.
UN Library Resources
The UN is an accomplished publisher, through their sales lists is not
particularly large. It is just that anything they do publish is of a
very high standard. Many documents are generated by the numerous
meetings and efforts, so there is a second style of publishing, called
Masthead or UNDoc documents, that are usually just photocopies. UNDoc
are found in a collection of UN depository libraries around the world.
(There is a good list at http://www.un.org/MoreInfo/Deplib/). Thus we
have the UNDoc primary source documents and UN Sales Documents, given a
sales document number and sold and shelved in libraries as books.
S/1997/742/Add.1, Report of the Secretary-General on the situation
concerning Western Sahara: a brief breakdown of the estimated costs for
completing the voter identification process in Western Sahara.
Other documents have wider appeal...
E.96.I.5, The United Nations and the International Tribunals for the
former Yugoslavia and Rwanda - UN Blue Book Series
S/1997/742/Add.1, Abortion Policies: A Global Review, Population
studies No. 129: A three volume, 650 page country-by-country look at
abortion.
You can use the US Library of Congress Online Catalogue for a good
approximate search of UN Sales documents. A search of UNDoc documents
requires one of three comprehensive databases, like UN-Bis Plus, though
you can also get the numbers to specific documents through UN
periodicals like the Yearbook of the United Nations and the United
Nations Chronicle.
With 300+ shelves of UN documents at depository libraries, the UNDoc
files are excellent records to history. The UNDoc Current Index (ceased
publication in 1996) is an extensive quarterly directory (of the
non-cumulative kind) just for this purpose.
Further tools are available to help the dedicated searcher, like
focused indexes and an annual list of current sales documents (also
online).
Trouble with Age
United Nations publications do suffer time lags. The best documents
appear well after the curve of public interest. Primary UNDOC documents
will take up to 6 months before becoming available at a UN depository
library and the Sales Documents are compiled after this. On the
positive side, UN archives frequently extend back to the 1950s.
Information Theory
The UN has existed since the 1950s. The systems established to manage
and distribute access to UN publications is at once both highly
sophisticated and out-of-date. It is truly amazing to see 300 shelves
of UN documents (a very big room mainly filled with stapled
photocopies).
At the same time, it is only a matter of time before the whole concept
of UN depository library is translated online. There is such potential
savings (there are 359 depository libraries in the world but the UN
pays for one in each country) and such an improvement in access.
All the links and a few of the forms for searching UN information
reside at http://spireproject.com/un.htm
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