LibGuides: EDUC BC3044 Education and Social Change in Comparative Global Contexts: Country Information

Country Information: Getting Started

Country profiles summarize statistical information on a specific country that include economic, political, sociological, environmental and other factors.

As part of your assignments for this course, you will be asked to find basic information about specific countries. Some of that information might include searching for:

History and government information for a focal population
Population/demographic overviews
Economic indicators (income, spending, etc.)
Poverty levels and rates
Education statistics including school enrollment, literacy rates, public spending on education

The following resources highlighted in this guide were selected because they are helpful in finding information for a country a profile.

Databases

OECD iLibrary
This is the online publications portal of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
Statista
Statista provides access to statistics and studies gathered by market researchers, trade organizations, scientific publications, and government sources on over 600 industries. This will link to statistics, but not downloadable datasets. You might be able to follow the sources to the data providers.
Columbia International Affairs Online Journals (CIAO)
CIAO features a wide range of scholarship from 1991 onward that includes working papers from university research institutes, occasional papers series from NGOs, foundation-funded research projects, proceedings from conferences, books, journals and policy briefs.
PAIS Index
Indexes journal articles; books; government documents; statistical compilations; committee reports; directories; serials; reports of public, intergovernmental, and private organizations; and most other forms of printed literature from all over the world. Areas covered include the literature of public policy, social policy, and the social sciences in general.
Europa World Plus
Europa World is a meticulously researched global resource including political, economic and statistical information about more than 250 countries and territories, as well as international and regional organizations. The Europa World Year Book was first published in 1926 and, together with the nine Regional Surveys of the World, is renowned as one of the world's leading reference works.
World Databank
World DataBank is a portal to access each of the World Bank datasets, including its World Development Indicators, Global Financial Database, Poverty and Equity Database, Gender Statistics, and more. Users can create custom extracts and export data into various tabular formats.

Additional Resources

BBC News Country Profiles
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.
Country Insights from GlobalEDGE at the University of Michigan
This is your source for statistical data for nearly every country around the world. In addition to statistics, historical, economic, and political conditions are available; use our Executive Memos for fingertip access to current information and the globalEDGE network to locate members in each country.