Library

Sociology: Social Policy, Welfare and the State. Library Research Guide

This guide provides information on:

Reference

Resources for defining terms and explaining concepts

Journals

Journals are a good resource for scholarly information on your topic - below is a list of journals, still current, which publish articles on various aspects of Social Policy.

NOTE to find other social policy and welfare journals do a catalogue keyword search on the terms

“Public welfare” periodicals or “social policy” periodicals

Government Publications
  • Catalogue
    The library has an extensive Government publications collection use the catalogue keyword search and then

Modify your keyword search by location "Bundoora govt. pubns" from the drop down menu and sort by date - latest year.

eg Homelessness

NOTE Many Government publications are increasingly available via a link to the electronic version.

  • Libraries Australia – the National library database is good for finding Government publications it provides links to all electronic versions. It indexes government publicatons from around the world. Select Limit to Government and Australia.
  • Publications.gov.au - Access to Australian Government publications. A central place to search all publications from federal government departments and agencies.
  • Federal Government departments - Alternatively each department has their own publications page that you can browse

  • Victorian Government Publications Index Victorian Government Publications Index lists all Victorian state and local government publications received by the State Library of Victoria since 1987.
    Parliamentary library publications search good for current research on social policy

Finding journal articles - searching databases

Journal titles are listed in the catalogue NOT journal articles

Journal articles are indexed in electronic databases and printed indexes

To find journal articles on a specific topic you need to search a selection of online databases

Databases for Social policy Research

Australian content databases

ABS – Australian Bureau of Statistics

APAFT – (full text) Subject coverage includes social sciences, health, current affairs, economics, and politics.

APAIS Health – topics cover the legal social and ethical aspects of health. .

ATSIhealth - Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Bibliography

Family : Australian Family and Society Abstracts

Health & Society social aspects of health

Informit databases – APAFT, Family, and APAIS Health are all part of the Informit database titles. You can select to search multiple databases or groups of databases eg Social Sciences and Medicine & Health

International content databases - including Australian content

Econlit - good articles for economic topics such as Housing Affordability

Expanded Academic (full text) a general undergraduate database which covers the social sciences and allied health topics

Proquest – Social Sciences and Humanities Database (full text) more US centred than the other International databases

Social Services Abstracts - try for the Homelessness and Poverty topics

Sociological Abstracts – provides the sociological perspective for social issues.

Google Scholar – try using the advanced search then limit to Arts and Social Sciences

NOTE Search in multiple databases – you will retrieve different material as they index different journals

Locating the articles/books

Always check the catalogue first.

Do we hold the Journal title?

Do we have the year that your article is published?

Is there more than one entry in the catalogue? Check both as there will be different
access to the journal

No holdings check if it is available locally at another Victorian library

News & Media resources
  • Factiva for all local, national and international newpapers - full text
  • Radio National Select individual programs from the drop down menu – all transcripts are available
  • Four Corners archive Links to transcripts of programs
  • Infokoori - Index to the Koori Mail
Social Policy & Welfare Recommended Internet resources

Australian Council of Social Service Access to Information papers and Submissions on various social issues from the publications link

Australian Institute of Health and Welfare For free access to 2 the publications Australia's Health 2006 and Australia's Welfare 2005

Social Policy Research Centre - (University of NSW) Detailed discussion papers on various social issues can be found, along with the newsletter, from the publications link.

Social policy research papers - many recent publications by the Department of Families, Housing, Community services, and Indigenous affairs

Australian Policy Online news and research from leading Australian research centres and institutes

Australian Indigenous HealthInfoNet - part of Kurongkurl Katitjin, the School of Indigenous Australian Studies at Edith Cowan University . It includes published, unpublished and specially-developed material about Indigenous health

Parliamentary Library Social Policy Resource Guide – a gateway to information on Australian Social Policy

NATSEM National Centre for Social and Economic Modelling

Department of Families, Communities and Indigenous Affairs

Australian Bureau of Statistics

Australian social trends has chapters on family, work and health

The Australian year book has articles and statistics on health, work, income and welfare

Office of Indigenous Policy Coordination

OECD :social issues Good for comparative material on international social policy

World Health Organization Coverage of worldwide statistical health information

Help

Contact your subject librarian for advice on finding relevant electronic and print resources, or assistance on how to use the databases effectively.