About this collection

 

The major challenges facing the world today—such as borders, climate change, gun control, mass incarceration, pandemics and financial crises, are often studied using newspaper articles, magazines, and bite-sized synopses. Global Issues Library  offers a multimedia approach to the study of global issues by providing access to deep primary sources, essays, books, case studies, and commentary, as well as documentaries and historical news footage.

Organized and indexed around key issues affecting humanity, the Global Issues Library also gives voice to personal experiences through video interviews, oral histories, letters, and diaries, helping students to empathize with people and populations affected. Government reports, books, and documentaries provides insights into the regional and global impact of events. Historical materials give context to topics and enable students to compare the issues of today with examples from the past.

Thematic Coverage

The Global Issues Library will grow with new themed collections every year, covering events from the 1700s to the present which are critical to understanding the global affairs of today—including U.S./Mexico border issues, the Rwandan genocide, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the Cuban Revolution, climate migration in the Pacific, international nuclear disarmament, and mass incarceration.

Curated by cross-disciplinary advisory boards of scholars from around the world, the current Library  includes:

  • Over 600,000 pages, including rare, previously unpublished archival material, government documents, oral histories, and personal narratives;

  • 900 hours of streaming documentaries, media footage, and other types of video;

  • 300 case studies for the classroom;

  • 3,000 photographs.

Issues and events are presented from multiple perspectives—personal, governmental, institutional, legal, contemporaneous, and retrospective— permitting the comparison of issues in a variety of contexts and in an interdisciplinary manner. Students and scholars can consider:

  • How atrocities and war occur and their aftermath across borders;

  • How climate change and security issues affect displacement;

  • The global history of disaster planning and emergency management;

  • The triggers of revolutions and what follows after regime changes.

  • The global trends in mass incarceration and the prison infrastructure of specific countries.

 

 

Teaching Power

Opportunities for comparative study: Content is organized around thematic units, such as the Cambodian genocide, the Burma-Myanmar conflict, the Iranian Revolution of 1953, and the European Union and its borders. This structure allows students to compare issues geographically, historically, or from other viewpoints.

Interdisciplinary: Aligning with curricula, the Global Issues Library combines historical, political, sociological, artistic, and human rights perspectives. It supports research and teaching in international studies, global affairs, history, political science, economic history, sociology, security studies, peace studies, law, public policy, environmental studies, and anthropology.

 

The Collections:

Borders and Migration Studies Online

Contemporary Global Issues in Video (video only) 

Engineering Case Studies Online

Environmental Issues Online

Human Rights Studies Online

Mass Incarceration and Prison Studies

Revolution and Protest Online

Security Issues Online

Trade and Globalization Studies Online (coming soon!)

 

 

Content Providers

ARCHIVES:

Institute of Commonwealth Studies, Senate House Library, University of London

Institute of Latin American Studies, Senate House Library, University of London

National Archives and Records Administration (United States)

The National Archives (United Kingdom)

William J. Clinton Presidential Library and Museum

The Sierra Club Archive

The Water Resources Archive, Colorado State University

 

IMAGES:

Bridgeman Images

Getty Images Science

Photo Library

 

PUBLISHERS:

ABC-CLIO

Beacon Press

Cambridge University Press

Francis & Taylor

Indiana University Press

Hong Kong University Press

Institute for Diplomatic Studies, Georgetown University

L’Harmattan

Lynne Rienner Publishers

Oxford University Press

Russell Sage Foundation

University of Bristol, Policy Press

University of California Press

 

VIDEO

American Public Television

Artegios

BBC Worldwide

Berkeley Media

Chip Taylor Communications

Cinema Libre

Cinemashena

Content Media Corporation

Doriane Films

Elo Audiovisual Serviços

Filmakers Library

Forward Films Productions

Gravitas

Java Film

LogTV

Prime Entertainment

WGBH Educational Foundation

Windrose

 

ADVISORY BOARDS

Holly Ackerman, Librarian for Latin American, Iberian and Latino Studies, Duke University

https://library.duke.edu/about/directory/staff/holly.ackerman

 

Laetitia Atlani-Duault, Fellow at the French National Development Research Institute, Professor at IRD - CEPED (Sorbonne Paris Cité University, Paris V René Descartes), Director of the Collège d’Études Mondiales (CEM) at the Fondation Maison des sciences de l’homme (FMSH)

http://www.fmsh.fr/en/college-etudesmondiales/255

 

Vanessa Barker, Docent and Associate Professor of Sociology, Stockholm University

https://www.su.se/english/profiles/vbark-1.187477

 

Olivier Bercault, lawyer and researcher for Human Rights Watch

https://www.amazon.com/Darfur-Kenneth-Roth/dp/1933045779

 

Mary Bosworth, Professor of Criminology, Fellow of St Cross College, University of Oxford; Professor of Criminology, Monash University, Australia; and Director of the Border Criminologies Network

https://www.law.ox.ac.uk/people/mary-bosworth

 

Orville Vernon Burton, Distinguished Professor of History, Sociology, and Computer Science, Clemson University; and Director of the Clemson CyberInstitute

https://www.oah.org/lectures/lecturers/view/1013/orville-vernon-burton/

 

Phillip A. Cantrell, Associate Professor of Asian History, African History, World History, Longwood University

http://www.longwood.edu/directory/profile/cantrellpalongwoodedu/

 

Yuk Wah Chan, Associate Professor, City University of Hong Kong

https://scholars.cityu.edu.hk/person/yukchan

 

Melissa Checker, Hagedorn Professor of Urban Studies and Environmental Psychology, Queens College (CUNY)

http://people.qc.cuny.edu/Faculty/Melissa.Checker/Pages/Default.aspx

 

Hastings Donnan, Director of the Mitchell Institute for Global Peace Security and Justice and Co-Director of the Centre for International Borders Research, Queen’s University, Belfast

https://pure.qub.ac.uk/en/persons/hastings-donnan

 

Baz Dreisinger, Professor, John Jay College of Criminal Justice

https://www.jjay.cuny.edu/faculty/baz-dreisinger

 

Hannah Elsisi, Lecturer in Modern Middle East History, King’s College London

https://www.kcl.ac.uk/people/hannah-elsisi

 

Julie Murphy Erfani, Associate Professor, School of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Arizona State University, and director of ASU's master's program in Social Justice and Human Rights

https://isearch.asu.edu/profile/40266

 

Catherine Filloux, award-winning playwright, longtime social justice advocate

https://www.catherinefilloux.com/

 

Pamela Graham, Director of the Center for Human Rights Documentation & Research,

Columbia University, and Director of the Global Studies division of the Libraries

http://laic.columbia.edu/author/7369258147/

 

Amy S. Green, Chairperson & Associate Professor, John Jay College of Criminal Justice

http://www.jjay.cuny.edu/faculty/amy-green-0

 

Anna Gunderson, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Louisiana State University

https://www.lsu.edu/hss/polisci/faculty_and_staff/gunderson.php

 

 

Pranoto Iskandar, Founding Director, The Institute for Migrant Rights,Indonesia

https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8553-1692

 

Cathia Jenainati, Dean of the School of Arts and Sciences, Lebanese American University; former Head of the School for Cross-Faculty Studies, University of Warwick

https://www.lau.edu.lb/about/governance/executive-officers/cathia-jenainati.php

 

Lada Kochtcheeva, Associate Professor, Global Environmental Policy and Law, North Carolina State University

https://faculty.chass.ncsu.edu/lvkochtc

 

Richard Matthew, Associate Dean of Research and International Programs and Professor of Urban Planning, Public Policy and Political Science, University of California, Irvine

https://faculty.sites.uci.edu/rmatthew/

 

Molly Molloy, Research Librarian, Border and Latin American specialist, New Mexico State UniversityLibrary

https://smallwarsjournal.com/author/molly-molloy

 

Vivian D. Nixon, Executive Director, College & Community Fellowship

https://www.collegeandcommunity.org/vivian-nixon

 

James Oleson, Associate Professor, University of Auckland

http://www.arts.auckland.ac.nz/people/jole011

 

David Scheffer, Director, Center for International Human Rights at Northwestern University, former US ambassador-at-large for war crimes issues

http://www.law.northwestern.edu/faculty/profiles/DavidScheffer/

 

Scott Schimmel, Assistant Professor of Communications, Environmental Science, University of Hawai’i

https://www.scottschimmel.com/about

 

Andrew Taylor, Research Scientist, Research Analyst at Vera Institute of Justice

https://www.vera.org/people/andrew-taylor

 

Ruti Teitel, Professor of Comparative Law, Chair, Global Law and Justice Colloquium

Co-Director, Institute for Global Law, Justice & Policy, New York Law School

https://www.nyls.edu/faculty/faculty-profiles/faculty_profiles/ruti_g_teitel/

 

Taufiq Chowdhury, Professor of Finance, Southampton University, UK

Roland Littlewood, Professor of Anthropology and Psychiatry, University College London, UK