Home - POL 260 - Intro to International Relations

How to Critically Evaluate Sources

When researching:

Search in multiple places (ex. popular sources, news sources, professional sources, scholarly sources)
Seek diverse voices
Search using multiple search terms, that you adapt as you learn more details about your topic
Make the goal of your search to:
- Find supporting evidence
- Find information that extends your knowledge / understanding
- Find opposing viewpoints

Be critical of the source. Ask:

Who is the author? Are they an expert? Someone with a lived experience? Who is the publisher? Are they reputable? Biased?
What is their purpose to write this? To inform? Educate? Persuade? Sell?
Is this information current or published in a time-frame that makes it relevant to my needs?

Think critically about the information in the source. Ask:

What claim/argument is the author is making? What is the central idea of this source?
What evidence does the author use to support their argument? Is it personal/lived experience? Statistical/numerical? Observed? Experimental and reproducible? How is it valuable for your information needs?
What perspectives are dominant? (Ex. Is this Eurocentric? Gender focused?) What perspectives are missing?
Can I use the findings/conclusions to predict outcomes in related areas?
How can I connect the information/ideas in this source to other sources to create a conversation between them?

World News Digest
World News Digest is a go-to resource for context and background on key issues and events in the news from 1940-present. In addition to news articles, WND aggregates social media feeds and includes editorial cartoons, historical documents infographics and statistics. Hundreds of news sources, governments, and organizations—including ABC News, CBS News, CNN, Fox News, NBC News, NPR, and the parliaments of Canada and Australia—rely on World News Digest for a broader view of the issues that matter today.
Global Newsstream
Global Newsstream enables users to search the most recent global news content, as well as archives which stretch back into the 1980s featuring newspapers, newswires, blogs, and news sites in active full- text format.
View Title List

Harvard Think Tank Search
A custom Google search created by Harvard University that searches the websites of institutions that generate public policy research, analysis, and activity. These sites are affiliated with universities, governments, advocacy groups, foundations, and non-governmental organizations.

Columbia International Affairs Online (CIAO)
Includes working papers from university research institutes, occasional papers series from NGOs, foundation-funded research projects, books, journals, policy briefs, and proceedings from conferences.

CRS Reports
Good for US perspective on issues. This collection provides the public with access to research products produced by the Congressional Research Service (CRS) for the United States Congress. By law, CRS works exclusively for Congress, providing timely, objective, and authoritative research and analysis to committees and Members of both the House and Senate, regardless of political party affiliation. As a legislative branch agency within the Library of Congress, CRS has been a valued and respected resource on Capitol Hill for more than a century.

HeinOnline Academic
HeinOnline Academic includes more than 100 million pages of multidisciplinary content in more than 100 subject areas, including history, political science, criminal justice, religious studies, international relations, women’s studies, pre-law, and many more. HeinOnline provides access to 300+ years of information on political development and the complete history of the creation of government and legal systems around the world.
Annual Review of Political Science
Synthesizes and covers significant developments in the field of political science in one annual volume. Search or browse. Full-text access from 1998 to present.
Web of Science
Web of Science provides access to the world's leading citation databases in the Sciences, Social Sciences and Arts and Humanities, covering approximately 12,000 of the highest impact journals, as well as 160,000 conference proceedings. Centre has access to coverage from 1999 to present.
Video tutorials