Foreign & International Law FAQs: In-Depth Research

How do I get started?

What should I include in research planning?

What are the best secondary sources for foreign law topics?

What are the best secondary sources for international law topics?

How do I access ebooks?

How do I find foreign laws when I have a citation?

How do I find foreign laws when I do NOT have a citation?

Why is it so hard to find cases for some countries?

How do I find cases by topic across jurisdictions?

How do I research the history of a treaty?

Although different countries have different systems and international law is very different from domestic law, you will follow the same basic process: 

1. Make a plan - determine what you're trying to research, the question you're trying to answer. 
2. Find useful secondary sources that explain - be it the law of a particular jurisdiction, the comparative method, the topic of international law. See these helpful lists of secondary sources in foreign law and international law.
3. Use primary sources in your analysis, paying particular attention to the context of that source within the legal system you are researching. Several questions below address strategies for finding these sources. Remember that different domestic systems may have different sources, and the sources of international law are very different from foreign law.

You will more than likely move between these steps at different times. For example, you may think you have a good plan, and then alter it based on what's actually available; or you may read just a couple of secondary sources to get acclimated, then read some cases, and then jump back into another type of secondary source. 

One of the most challenging aspects of FCIL research is the sheer volume of places to go. I recommend you keep detailed notes, try to think of just a few places to begin, and resign yourself to the fact that you may need to visit more than just one database. Though it may take longer than you've experienced for U.S. issues, FCIL research is manageable. 

It will ultimately depend on your specific research question and the type of research you are conducting. Broadly, you may want to consider: 

• The question/task: What exactly are you looking to identify or answer? Include here related ideas or follow-up questions so you can write them down and process them. 
• Type of law: How would you classify the overall area of law - things to ask about: is this about one country? Two? Multiple? Is this public or private in nature? Is it specific to an organization or a topic more broadly? Might you call it foreign, comparative, public international? across multiple types? Here we are classifying the information so that we may use the following to fill in the context - context is key.
• Specific entities of interest & key characteristics: Are you looking into a specific foreign jurisdiction or international organization? Some important considerations may be: 
  • Foreign Law: Jurisdiction; Legal System and consequences of that (civil/common/etc.); governmental entity (national/federal/other political subdivision); area of law and what documents you think you might need. For comparative law by countries: ask these questions of each country. 
  • International Law: 
    • Treaty (when you know you have one): Name; Classify type: bilateral / multilateral; Parties; Any international organization involved that you know of?
    • By international organization (when you know you have one): What are the relevant bodies within the organization? What documents are created by the organization?
    • By topic: Area of law and potential types of applicable international law, any international organizations. This includes non-codified international law (customary international law and general principles).
• Relevant facts
• Key search terms/concepts
• Plan of attack - based on what you know above, what sources in what order will you look to in an effort to answer the question? Steps should be concrete to help you get started. 

Though "best" is relative, a research guide can help you identify secondary sources on a particular country. I recommend either Foreign Law Guide, a library subscription, or GlobaLex, a free source. There are some differences between these sources in terms of coverage and currency so you may need to check both. Foreign Law Guide can, depending on the country, give you recommendations for secondary sources within a particular country by topic, so it's a very strong place to start.

A few particular recommendations:

• Overall: Google Scholar is a strong place to start for scholarly articles. It's limited only by what's available on the web, so it has coverage of more publishers and disciplines than you would find on Westlaw/Lexis. If you hit a paywall, search for the article on the law library website. 
• For comparative books generally: Start with Multinational Sources Compared on HeinOnline as it allows you to browse for books that compare by subject and/or country. Once you have the name of the book, check for it on the law library website. 
• For articles by subject or country: Start with the Index to Foreign Legal Periodicals on HeinOnline, which lists by subject or by country articles published outside of the U.S. or in U.S. journals focused on FCIL topics. 
• For comparative constitutional law: start with the Max Planck Encyclopedia of Comparative Constitutional Law. Entries typically have extensive bibliographies to help you expand your search. Note that coverage tends to be more in-depth than what you may have seen in U.S. legal encyclopedias.
• By country: Check our databases list to see if we have one focused on a particular country that contains secondary sources.

Though "best" is relative, a research guide can help you identify secondary sources on a particular topic. I recommend GlobaLex, a free source with coverage of many international law topics, or guides published from the institution you're interested in - for example, if you're interested in the UN, visit the UN Research Guides. A Google search of the phrase "research guide" and the topic/organization you're interested in is a good way to find this information. 

A few particular recommendations:

• Overall: Google Scholar is a strong place to start for scholarly articles. It's limited only by what's available on the web, so it has coverage of more publishers and disciplines than you would find on Westlaw/Lexis. If you hit a paywall, search for the article on the law library website. 
• For public international law: Start with Max Planck Encyclopedias of International Law for anything remotely related to public international law. This is the GOAT resource for international law and most entries have extensive bibliographies to direct you to other secondary sources. Note that coverage tends to be more in-depth than what you may have seen in U.S. legal encyclopedias. 
• For human rights: I would check the Elgar Encyclopedia of Human Rights for up-to-date coverage of human rights topics. Another strong contender is the Oxford Encyclopedia of Human Rights; this has not been updated since 2009, but it has country profiles, which are not currently included in the Elgar title. 
• For treaty law: There is a type of book called a commentary, which typically is organized article-by-article for a treaty. These are excellent resources and can be found by searching the law library website for the name of the treaty and the word commentary (for example, ICCPR commentary). 
• By topic: Check our databases list to see if we have one focused on a particular topic that contains secondary sources. (For example, Kluwer Arbitration is a great place to start for international arbitration.)
• For books: Search on the law library website for the subject and look under Catalog - we have an extensive collection of print and ebooks. Be sure to use broad terms as the book search is not a full-text search of individual books.

Ebooks can be searched the same way as a print book on the law library website and accessed from the link in the record. For technical ebook access questions, visit our Ebooks Guide or ask a reference librarian. 

You may need to take a few different approaches because every state is different. For the research guides listed in the below graphic, I recommend either Foreign Law Guide, a library subscription, or GlobaLex, a free source. There are some differences between these sources in terms of coverage and currency so you may need to check both. Both will include general places to find laws, including possibly available translations; Foreign Law Guide also includes a listing of primary sources by subject that can help you browse a bit better. 

A good general strategy is: 

If you're concerned with Bluebooking, see also What's the relationship between the Bluebook and source-pulling?

Generally, it is much easier to find a primary source when you do have a citation. Because of that, I recommend you first follow Steps 1 and 2 of the research process above and look at some initial secondary source recommendations for foreign/comparative law. For the research guides listed in the below graphic, I recommend either Foreign Law Guide, a library subscription, or GlobaLex, a free source. There are some differences between these sources in terms of coverage and currency so you may need to check both. Both will include general places to find laws, including possibly available translations; Foreign Law Guide also includes a listing of primary sources by subject that can help you browse a bit better. 

A suggestion for finding legislation, cases, and regulations:

See also How do I find cases by topic across jurisdictions?

In the U.S. and some other common law jurisdictions, case decisions are typically considered a source of law - they can establish laws, and we read them extensively. But most countries are not common law jurisdictions and would instead be considered civil law jurisdictions. Speaking in very generalized strokes, it is much less common for cases to be published in civil law systems - cases are binding only to the parties; they tend to be shorter and spend less time explaining their decisions. See our video A Brief Comparison of Legal Systems: Common and Civil Law for more information. 

There are exceptions to this general rule - most notably, many civil law countries have constitutional courts that engage in the kind of judicial review we are used to seeing in the U.S. Many court decisions, especially those on private matters and from lower-level courts, are still available in specialty databases, though they are rarely translated and these databases are very limited in availability. Check our databases list to see what we currently have access to. (For example, we subscribe to Dalloz, a French database that contains many decisions in French only that we would consider "unpublished.")

In addition to the basic recommendations that emphasize research guides and secondary sources for both foreign and international law, utilize topic-specific databases that collect cases across jurisdictions; see our specialty databases list. Here are just some examples: 

• International law/human rights: See International Law in Domestic Courts (ILDC) - this platform collects domestic court cases on international law topics (human rights including labor, sources of int'l law, criminal law, etc.). Each case should always have some analysis and headnotes in English plus the original decision in the vernacular. Many cases also include partial to full English translations. It currently has around 70 jurisdictions with coverage generally beginning around 2000 (more historical content is being added). 
• IP: Darts IP; this is also provides machine translations.
• Labor: It could be in International Labour Law Reports (highest courts on domestic labor issues) or it could be in the journal International Labor Rights Case Law (labor rights since 2015).
• Constitutional law: see the free database CODICES

The drafting history or negotiation history of a treaty (similar in concept to domestic legislative history) is found in the documents that were created at the time the treaty was drafted. These materials are known as travaux preparatoires. To research travaux, it's best to start with secondary sources first. (I recommend treaty commentaries in particular.) For more in-depth guidance, including how to move from secondary sources to the actual documents, start with this GlobaLex guide on travaux.