hurting those whom the boycott was intended to South Africa, other participants made it clear that aid, resulting in the availability of even fewer re­ the ANC is not the sole voice of anti-apartheid sources for libraries serving black students and forces. As Corinne Nyquist concluded, the impor­ scholars. tance of the session lies not in its resolution of the Audience response reflected the complexity of problem but in its open discussion. The panel will the topic. Several participants strongly supported be repeated at ALA Annual Conference in Dallas exemption of informational materials from an oth­ next summer.—Helen MacLam , Choice maga­ erwise solid boycott. Although the position of the zine. African National Congress is total isolation of A customized database on Scandinavian government By Martha L. Brogan and Robert B. Kvavik Assistant to the Provost and Vice President Assistant Vice President for Academic Affairs for Academic Affairs University of Minnesota University of Minnesota Customized bibliographic databases and educational innovation. T h e development of the Scandinavian political eign policy, Norwegian and Icelandic interest studies database is a joint project of Martha Bro­ groups, and coalition governments in Sweden. The gan, a professional librarian and former bibliogra­ customized lists were discussed with the students, pher for Western European Studies, and Robert B. and research themes were identified which could Kvavik, a political scientist with a specialty in be investigated using materials held by the Univer­ Scandinavian government and politics. sity Libraries. Originally and ultimately intended to facilitate The database also produced a master reading list the compilation of a published bibliography, the for an undergraduate class on Scandinavian poli­ project—while still in its developmental phase— tics. The electronic bibliography saved us, our has already served a beneficial use to support re­ students—and presumably some of our library search and instruction at the University of Minne­ staff—precious time in identifying and locating sota. During Winter Quarter 1988, in a graduate relevant materials. Rather, the faculty member’s seminar on Scandinavian government and politics, energy focused on helping students specify research the database was used effectively to develop spe­ problems, the student’s on synthesizing materials cialized readings lists on such topics as Finnish for­ and formulating positions on agreed-upon prob­ December 1988 / 735 lems in the field, and perhaps the librarian’s, on ju­ monographic literature, and Robert B. Kvavik’s dicious selection of new materials to add to the col­ “Scandinavian Government and Politics: A Bibli­ lections.1 ography of Materials in English” (1984). Of course, the strength of the bibliography, no With this intention to fill the nigh twenty-year matter what its format—electronic or in-print—is void, at a time when the English-language social based on the selection of materials it identifies and scientific literature on Scandinavia is flourishing, must be grounded in a thorough knowledge of both we set out to develop a search strategy for Scan­ the subject under consideration and the multiplic­ dinavia in political science. Our efforts were ity of sources where the subject is discussed. While greatly facilitated by the historic strength of the new technologies may simplify some of the tedious University Libraries’ collections in Scandinavian and mundane elements of producing a bibliogra­ Studies. We began with our local collections and phy, they do nothing to guarantee a quality prod­ established from the outset a principle of reviewing uct. The technology permits us to gather, store, each item for its potential inclusion, calling interli­ and manipulate data in new ways— and even occa­ brary loan services to the rescue only in isolated in­ sionally provides “management information” stances where the materials were not readily avail­ about what we have compiled—but the content of able at the University of Minnesota. the bibliography, upon which the ultimate value of Aided by PRO-CITE (in its early version called the tool rests, remains the domain of the subject PBS or Personal Bibliographic Software), citations specialist. This particular project has been espe­ were entered manually from such sources as: cially successful because of the combined skills in Suecana Extranea, Index Nordicus, Scandinavian bibliographic “sleuthing” and subject expertise Political Studies, Scandinavia in English, Books on which we could bring to it. Although it is entirely Sweden in English, Scandinavian Political Institu­ possible for one individual, whether teaching fac­ tions and Political Behavior 1970-1984, Documen­ ulty or professional subject bibliographer, to pos­ tation on Sweden, Nordic Democracy, Compara­ sess the requisite skills, we have found the collabo­ tive Public Policy: The Politics of Social Choice in rative approach to offer more checks and balances Europe and America, and “Scandinavian Govern­ to the project, and, we hope, to result in stronger ment and Politics: A Bibliography of Materials in final tool. English” (see bibliography). With few exceptions, When we began to work on this bibliography in no more than 20 percent of the items from these January 1986, an annotated bibliography of con­ bibliographies was selected for inclusion. Older temporary Scandinavian political science had not and dated bibliographies were reviewed primarily appeared since Sven Groennings’ Scandinavia in for identifying classic studies or works in fields no Social Science Literature: An English-Language longer in vogue. In addition, articles published Bibliography (1970). Although Scandinavian Po­ from 1970 to the present were selectively extracted litical Studies compiled cumulative bibliographies from such journals as Cooperation and Conflict, for the periods 1960-1975 and 1976-1979, they fo­ Acta Sociologica, Scandinavian Political Studies, cused on publications of Nordic political scientists, European Journal of Political Research, and West­ represented extensively the Scandinavian litera­ ern European Politics. ture, and were not annotated. Further, this effort Electronic downloading was done concomi­ ceased with the second cumulation. tantly using Biblio-link. We ran searches on exter­ The more recent work by Kjell Eliassen and Mo- nal databases such as the Online Union Catalog of gens Pedersen, Scandinavian Political Institutions OCLC, the RLIN files of the Research Libraries and Political Behavior, 1970-1984: An Annotated Group, and the bibliographic databases offered by Bibliography (1985), is limited to Norway, Den­ Lockheed Information Systems (Dialog). In the mark, and Sweden, and focuses more narrowly on latter case, we searched U.S. Political Science Doc­ political institutions and elites, political participa­ uments (USPSD), Historical Abstracts, Social Sci- tion, the decision-making process, and the public search, and Public Affairs Information Service sector. Despite its subtitle, it employs a classified (PAIS). Subject headings for politics, e.g., eco­ subject approach rather than annotations and it nomic policy, political parties, were employed for lacks an index. Other less comprehensive efforts each of the Scandinavian countries and with Scan­ have also been attempted, mainly as extended dinavia and Northern Europe; no documents pub­ course reading lists, such as Eric Einhorn and John lished prior to 1970 or in languages other than En­ Logue’s “A Selective Bibliography of Scandinavian glish were requested by the search protocol. The Politics and Policy” (1984), which is limited to entire database was then screened for duplicates and irrelevant materials. We also deleted articles which were felt to be out of date or had been 1The original version of this paper was presented slightly modified and published anew in less com­ at the Annual Meeting of the Society for the Ad­ mon and hard-to-find journals. vancement of Scandinavian Studies, April 28-30, 1988, at Eugene, Oregon. The project is supported While the working corpus was being estab­ by a small grant from the Educational Develop­ lished, we began to design the codebook to be used ment Programs office at the University of Minne­ for indexing the citations. The codebook provides sota. access to the database by five broad categories: for­ 736 / C&RL News mat (e.g., book, article, serial), country, focus of grating of records from external databases such as study (e.g., whether it was a case study or compar­ the Online Union Catalog of OCLC, the RLIN ative analysis), type of study (e.g., statistics, bibli­ files of the Research Libraries Group, or the biblio­ ography, government publication), and, most im­ graphic databases offered by Lockheed Informa­ portantly, subject. tion Systems (Dialog) and BRS. It is run on an IBM The creation of the topical index in particular PC or compatible machine using DOS 2.0 or proved invaluable in refining the subject scope of greater. It is not practical to use PRO-CITE with­ the bibliography and in improving our search strat­ out a hard disk and less than 640K of RAM. egy. The bibliography covers the following subject The database is created by entering records (ele­ areas: government structure; political thought, be­ ments of a bibliographic citation) into one of havior, and organization; political parties and in­ twenty different data entry work forms, each work stitutions; public administration and policy; insti­ form corresponding to a particular type