Library News for Political Science

EU Begins Pilot Open-Access Project

Following in the footsteps of the National Institutes of Health, which now demands researchers who received funding from it to deposit their results in the institutes' online archive within 12 months of publication, the European Commission has launched a pilot project to provide open access to E.U.-financed research findings. The project the Commission announced today will give total online access to E.U.-funded research results after an embargo period of between 6 and 12 months. This pilot, which will run until the end of 2008, will cover about 20 percent of the research financed with the 50 billion euro budget of E.U.'s 7th Research Framework Program. With this measure, the European Commission wants to make sure that the results of the research it finances "are disseminated as widely and effectively as possible to guarantee maximum exploitation and impact in the world of researchers and beyond," according to a press release. More details on the pilot project will be available on September 1 at the project's website. --Maria José Viñas

Opening Soon: European Digital Library

From the news release:

Europe’s cultural diversity in books, music, paintings, photographs, and films open to all citizens at the click of a mouse via one portal – this dream of a European Digital Library could become reality this autumn. However, further efforts by the EU Member States are needed, said the Commission today in a new Communication on making available digital versions of works from cultural institutions all over Europe. Digitisation of cultural works can give Europeans access to material from museums, libraries and archives abroad without having to travel or turn hundreds of pages to find a piece of information. Europe’s libraries alone contain more than 2.5 billion books, but only about 1% of archival material is available in digital form. The Commission therefore called on Member States to do more to make digitised works available online for Europeans to browse them digitally, for study, work or leisure. The Commission itself will provide some € 120 million in 2009-2010 for improving online access to Europe’s cultural heritage.

“The European Digital Library will be a quick and easy way for people to access European books and art – whether in their home country or abroad. It will, for example, enable a Czech student to browse the British library without going to London, or an Irish art lover to get close to the Mona Lisa without queuing at the Louvre,” said Viviane Reding, EU Commissioner for Information Society and Media.

EU Digitizing Documents

This post from a listserv:

Hello,

 

The EU has begun a major digitization project which I thought you should know about. All details are not clear yet, but here is what I know.

 

As you may know, for years now the University Library System (ULS), University of Pittsburgh, has been digitizing EU documents and placing them on the Archive of European Integration (AEI) http://aei.pitt.edu Last year the Delegation of the European Commission to the U.S., Washington, DC, gave its entire EU library collection to the ULS. This collection is significantly larger than any of the other EU depositories in North America. A somewhat detailed description of this collection can be seen in an article entitled "European Union Archival Collection at the University of Pittsburgh" on the EUSA website http://www.eustudies.org, click on Publications/EUSA Review, see Winter 2008 Issue of the EUSA Review: article is pp. 32-43 in PDF format. We here at the ULS had the intent to digitize significant numbers of EU documents from this Delegation collection and place them onto the AEI. Before doing so, I travelled to Luxembourg in March and spoke with several of the staff at the Office of Official Publications (OOP) to find out what digitization plans they have. They are in the first stages of a multi-year plan to digitize - with full text searching capability - nearly all of the historic publications of the OOP back to the early 1950s. These will be placed on the EU Bookshop website, free to all. Concurrently, EU documents not published by the OOP, but rather by DGs and other institutions, will be digitized and placed onto EUR-Lex. Both of these databases will be accessible through a single search engine.

 

Consequently, we at the AEI are in constant consultation with the OOP about their digitization parameters, and we will concentrate on digitizing documents which the EU does not intend to digitize. Which documents, and how many, remain to be seen. In the end, this joint digitization project will make a very high percentage of the entire historic EU collection available, free to all.

 

Best, Phil Wilkin

European Library User Guide Now Available

European Library User Guide Now Available in 12 Languages

from ResourceShelf by resourceshelf

First time visitors can now view The European Library User Guide in 12 languages; English but also Danish, Dutch French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Icelandic, Norwegian, Portuguese, Spanish and Swedish. The User Guide is designed to help new visitors discover all search possibilities offered by The European Library portal.

Source: European Library

First time visitors can now view The European Library User Guide in 12 languages; English but also Danish, Dutch French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Icelandic, Norwegian, Portuguese, Spanish and Swedish. The User Guide is designed to help new visitors discover all search possibilities offered by The European Library portal.

Source: European Library

EU Documents to go to the Archive of European Integration

The following message was sent to the EURODOC listserv by Phil Wilkin, Social Sciences Bibliographer and Editor of the Archive of European Integration at the University of Pittsburgh.

The Delegation of the European Commission to the US, Washington, DC, recently decided to divulge itself of its entire depository collection and award it to one of the existing depository libraries in North America. The Delegation awarded this collection to the University Library System, University of Pittsburgh, currently the home of the Archive of European Integration (AEI). This depository collection begins in the early 1950s and is easily the largest EU collection in the Western Hemisphere. Over the next several years, the AEI will digitize many documents from this collection and upload them.

The following message was sent to the EURODOC listserv by Phil Wilkin, Social Sciences Bibliographer and Editor of the Archive of European Integration at the University of Pittsburgh.

The Delegation of the European Commission to the US, Washington, DC, recently decided to divulge itself of its entire depository collection and award it to one of the existing depository libraries in North America. The Delegation awarded this collection to the University Library System, University of Pittsburgh, currently the home of the Archive of European Integration (AEI). This depository collection begins in the early 1950s and is easily the largest EU collection in the Western Hemisphere. Over the next several years, the AEI will digitize many documents from this collection and upload them.

European Commission's Central Library Launches New Catalog on EUROPA

The European Commission’s Central Library Launches New ECLAS Catalogue on EUROPA.

February 13, 2007 at 12:57 am · Filed under Libraries and Librarianship, Info Management and Retrieval

The European Commission’s Central Library Launches New ECLAS catalogue on EUROPA.
From the announcement:

The catalogue gives access to the collections of the Commission’s Central Library as well as to those of the libraries in the many Directorates General and services which are members of the RéseauBib network.

While the principal subjects covered are European integration and European law and policies, the collections also include many works on the

Member

States

, international affairs and third countries in all the official languages. The catalogue contains detailed bibliographical information on each item and is constantly updated.

The easy-to-use interface is available in English and French and, through the various search options, caters to both novices and experts. Readers have free access to the entire catalogue and, by registering, can set up alerts and save searches. Searches can also be limited to more specialised sub-catalogues, such as journals, e-journals or the ECLAS thesaurus.

Direct to ECLAS Catalogue
 
The European Commission’s Central Library Launches New ECLAS catalogue on EUROPA.
From the announcement:

The catalogue gives access to the collections of the Commission’s Central Library as well as to those of the libraries in the many Directorates General and services which are members of the RéseauBib network.

While the principal subjects covered are European integration and European law and policies, the collections also include many works on the

Member

States

, international affairs and third countries in all the official languages. The catalogue contains detailed bibliographical information on each item and is constantly updated.

The easy-to-use interface is available in English and French and, through the various search options, caters to both novices and experts. Readers have free access to the entire catalogue and, by registering, can set up alerts and save searches. Searches can also be limited to more specialised sub-catalogues, such as journals, e-journals or the ECLAS thesaurus.

Direct to ECLAS Catalogue

Source: EUROPA / European Commission; (via ResourceShelf)