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European Government Information


Search Engines & Catalogs | Gateways | Parliamentary Information | Foreign Law Guides


The University of California Berkeley houses a strong collection of European Documents and legislative information. The following page includes links to gateway sites for European governments, as well as sites of European Parliaments and legal guides.


Search Engines and UC Berkeley Catalogs

Find a book that matches your topic and go to the call number range to browse. Check the references and bibliography. Catalogs often display little information about the contents of books, so when in doubt check.

Pathinder and Gladis. UC Berkeley libraries catalog. The telnet version Gladis has some features like detailed holdings information that can be important for historical research, e.g. volume numbers for large sets or reels of microfilm.

Melvyl. Catalog for all UC Campus libraries. Includes libraries on campus not in Pathfinder, e.g. the Boalt Law Library and Institute of Governmental Studies.

Google Scholar. This search engine functions as both a key word database for articles and books. It automatically connects you to some licensed content held by the UC libraries. Search this source before all others.

Government Gateway Sites

The following are directories of European government gateway sites. Many are useful for locating important ministries and offices that might be difficult to find by browsing the main government homepage.

Eurodocs. Primary historical documents from Western Europe. Focus on key historical events within the respective countries, including politic, economics, and social and cultural history.

European Governments Online. Main governmental sites for European countries. Includes sites for the Head of State, the Government, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and some portal sites for the national civil service.

Foreign Governments. Contains extensive links for each country, including parliaments, ministries, cabinets, and central banks. From Northwestern University Government Publications and Maps.

Foreign Governments: Europe. Informative site with annotations for each country. Includes links to other regions, as well as information on laws and treaties and statistics. From the University of Michigan Documents Center.

Union of International Associations. Access to databases of the Union of International Organizations, with the details of international non-governmental and intergovernmental organizations, as well as names and biographical information of presidents, general secretaries, and other officers.

Parliamentary Information

This following are sources of European legislative information, primarlity homepages for European Parliaments with access to bills, parliamentary debates, and other legislative material.

Web guides in English for European Parliamenatary Information are scarce in English. See NYU Law Library's Guide to Foreign Law by Jursidiction and the Center for Research Libraries (CRL) for more information.

Austria

Osterreichischen Parlament. Features a database of selected Parliamentary documents, stenographic minutes, etc. Includes as browseable list of documents by subject (German).

Belgium

Federal Government On-line. Information on the monarchy, officials, and members of Parliament.

Senat de Belgique. Includes electronic version of the Periodical of the Senate (see section on documentation).

Denmark

Retsinformation. Includes legislation adopted in the past 15 years and current legilsative proposals in Danish.

Folketinget. Parliament database. Includes recent law proposals.

Finland

FINLEX. Database of Finnish legislation with a list of changes made on any law or decree published in the Finnish Official Gazette since 1734.

France

The Journal officiel is the official gazette of France. It contains texts of national laws and decrees, important administrative orders and proclamations, and parliamentary debates and committee reports. Below are print holdings of several of the more important parts.

Assemblée Nationale and Senat. Websites for the National Assembly and the Senate

LegiFrance. Portal to French law on the Internet, with full-text access to legislation, regulations and case law, directly or through links to other government websites. Includes translations of French acts.

Journal officiel de la République Française. Online version of the Official Journal of France.

Germany

For guides to German Government publications, see the web guies of the London School of Economics the British Library and the Indiana University guide to German Parliamentary Papers.

The Bundestag (Federal Assembly) and the Bundesrat (Federal Council) publish two main series of proceedings (Verhandlungen): Stenographische Berichte or Plenarprotokolle (debates, resolutions, etc.) and Drucksachen (parliamentary papers and documents, including drafts of laws).

Dokumentations- und Informationssystem für Parlamentarische Vorgänge (DIP). Gateway to information from the German Bundestag. Includes legislative materials, draft bills, minutes of plenary sessions, activities of the Bundestag and Bundesrat, and information on parliamentary activities, from 1976.

Der Parlamentsspiegel. German federal materials published in the Bundestags- and Bundesrats Drucksachen from 1976, as well as legislative materials of the Laender. Minutes of plenary sessions of the Bundesrat are available from the 1st parliamentary term. To find full text materials, go to "Dokumente Suchen."

GESTA. Short for Gesetzgebungsstand - state of legislative projects. Full text of bills and legislative history documents, with links to the full text of Part I of the Bundesgesetzblatt (Federal Law Gazette) from 1998.

PARFORS. Document server of the Bundestag, which can be accessed through DIP as well. The full text of legislative materials starting from he 13th and 14th parliamentary terms (i.e. from late 1994).

German legal resources (court cases and statutes) are located in the Boalt Law Library. There are many excellent online guides to doing German legal research, e.g. at Georgetown University and the Indiana University School of Law.

Das Bundesgesetzblatt. German Federal Official Gazette. Full text available from 1996, with a searchable index. This is the official publication of German statutes, analogous to the U.S. Statutes at Large. Library has 1949 - present. Boalt Law Library KK10

Gesetze im Internet. Online portal to German law on the Internet. Contains virtually the entire corpus of German Federal Law.

The German Law Archive. Publishes cases, statutes, literature and bibliographies on German law in English.

Italy

Parlamento Italiano. Includes good section on legislation with bills from the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies from 1996. The Chamber site is in english.

Italian Official Publications on the Net. Comprehensive index of services and documentation produced by Italian government bodies. Maintained by the The Italian Library Association.

Luxembourg

Publications of the Central Service of Legislation

Official Journal of Luxembourg (Memorial)

The Netherlands

Overheid. Central access point for government information for the Netherlands. Contains full-text of laws, the Official Gazette from 1995, and publications.

Portugal

Assembleia da Republica. Includes the text of legislative initatives (bills) and current and historical parliamentary debates.

Sweden

Rixlex. Swedish parliament directives, reports, proposals, motions, parliamentary minutes, the catalog of the parliamentary library, and more.

Riksdag. Main site for the Swedish parliament. Go to the documents section for debates, decisions, and parliamentary activities (In English).

United Kingdom

Note: The library maintains complete collections of the British Parliamentary Papers in paper, fiche and electronic formats.

 

Foreign Law Guides


The Boalt Law Library has an excellent section of guides to Foreign Law, including European Law, on the Internet. Some of the more notable sources include:

Foreign Law Guide (Click subscriber login). Provides brief introductory information on the legal systems of 160 nations or jurisdictions, combined with a list of all codes and basic laws, where they can be found in their most current format in the offical language and any English translations, if available.

Government Gazettes Online. Attempts to provide a list of all online official government gazettes, including information about coverage of each.

Guide to Law Online: Nations of the World (Library of Congress). A country by country listing of legal resources.

World Law (AustLII) A global index and search engine for law including a country by country listing of legal resources. Includes section on Parliaments and Courts and Case Law.