A Selective Guide to Researching
Sustainable Growth and Development Issues
II. RESEARCH IN LEGAL PERIODICAL LITERATURE
With an increasing number of general and specialized scholarly journals, newsletters and newspapers publishing articles on sustainable growth and development issues, a good starting point for research is the legal periodical literature. Legal periodical indexes cover a far greater number of journals than is available through the full text law review and journal databases on LEXIS and WESTLAW.
The following indexes provide citations to and selected full text of articles. Each database varies somewhat in its coverage of the legal literature. To conduct a comprehensive search of the topic, it is important to search all indexes:
1. Current Index to Legal Periodicals
Current Index to Legal Periodicals (CILP) (commercial web version)
- Indexes articles from over 500 legal publications
- Citations only to journal articles organized by broad legal topics
- Complete tables of contents of journals indexed in CILP included in each issue
- Weekly
Search Tip:
Use the following topics in CILP to locate citations to current articles on sustainable growth and development:
Administrative Law
Economics
Energy and Utilities Law
Environmental Law
International Law
Land Use Planning
State and Local Government Law
Water Law
WESTLAW: CILP (most recent 8 weeks only)
Search Tip:
Restrict a search by “field.” For example: topic(“land use planning”) retrieves citations
to articles listed under the topic “land use planning.”
2. LegalTrac
- Citations to articles, often with abstracts
- Selected full text
- Over 875 journals, including law reviews, legal newspapers, bar association journals and international legal journals published in the U.S., Canada, Great Britain, New Zealand and Australia
- Also included are law-related articles from over 1,000 business and general journal titles
LegalTrac (commercial web version)
Search Tip:
Begin with a “keyword” search. Use " * " to retrieve variable endings of a word, for example: financ* will retrieve finance, finances, financing. From retrieved list of citations, click on a relevant title. Use the “Related Subjects” links to retrieve articles which discuss the topic even though the keywords used in the search do not appear in the title or abstract.
LEXIS (LAWREV;LRI) (1980-)
Search Tip: The segment "term" restricts a search to the words designated as "term" in each record. An example of a subject search using some of the words appearing as "term" would be: term(limited-growth policy) or term(urban land use)
WESTLAW (LRI) (1980-)
Search Tip: The field restriction "IN" restricts search terms to the "descriptors" (i.e., subject terms) of each record. Using some of the "descriptors" listed in the citations found from a keyword search, a broader subject search could be: in("regional planning") or in("city planning")
3. Index to Legal Periodicals and Books (ILP)
Index to Legal Periodicals Retrospective (1908-1981)
- Citations to articles and selected books
- Selected full text articles
- Coverage of over 500 law reviews, journals, yearbook and government publications from the United States, Puerto Rico, Canada, Great Britain, Ireland, Australia, and New Zealand
- Commercial Databases
Index to Legal Periodicals and Books (ILP) (1980-) (commercial web version)
Index to Legal Periodicals Retrospective (1908-1981) (commercial web version)
Search Tip:
Begin with a keyword search, for example: sprawl or smart growth or sustain*. Use the “subject(s)” links in a citation record to broaden a search.
LEXIS (LAWREV; ILP) (1978-)
Search Tip:
Use the segment "descriptors" and restrict a search to the words designated as "descriptors" in each record. “Descriptors” are words used to describe a topic, for example: descriptor(regional planning) or descriptor(land use)
WESTLAW (ILP) (July 1981 to date)
Search Tip:
Use the field restriction "IN" to restrict words to the "descriptors" (i.e., subject terms) of each
record. “Descriptors” are words used to describe a topic, for example: in("city planning") or in("economic development")
4. Environmental Law Reporter News & Analysis
- Published by the Environmental Law Institute (ELI)
- Monthly
- Contains scholarly articles on new areas of environmental law
- Each issue contains a "Journal Literature" section listing citations to journal articles by topic
ELR: Environmental Law Reporter (commercial web version)
Search Tip:
To conduct a "Journal Literature" search, click on "Indices and Search Tools," then "Cumulative U.S. Law
Review Bibliography."
LEXIS (ENVIRN;NEWS) (1971-)
Search Tip:
The segment "sec-name" restricts a search to the “Journal Literature” section of News & Analysis. Adding the segment "title" will further restrict a search to a particular subject. Thus, the search: sec-name(journal literature) and title(land use) will retrieve citations to articles appearing in "Journal Literature" section of News & Analysis under the topic "Land Use." Citations to articles link to selected full text of law review and journal articles available on LEXIS.
Print: Reserve: RESERVE (1ST FLOOR): Current; SL3: KF3775 .A6E5
5. Index to Foreign Legal Periodicals (IFLP)
- Published by the American Association of Law Libraries (AALL)
- Citations to articles
- 1985-
- Covers over 500 selected legal periodicals dealing with international law (public and private), comparative law and municipal law of those countries other than the U.S., the British Isles and the British Commonwealth, whose systems of law have a common law basis
- Source of discussion and analysis of international and foreign sustainable growth and development articles
Index to Foreign Legal Periodicals (IFLP) (commercial web version)
Search Tip:
Keywords common to the United States, such as “sprawl,” “smart growth,” “sustainable growth,” “brownfields,” etc., are not found in the database. Conducting a keyword search using the phrase “sustainable development” will retrieve articles discussing international and foreign sustainable growth and development issues. The broader subject search “planning and zoning” will retrieve additional articles discussing growth, planning, land use and zoning. The search may be limited by date and country.
1. Specialized Law Journals
Two law school journals specializing in sustainable development law are:
The McGill International Journal of Sustainable Development Law and Policy (McGill University)
Sustainable Development Law & Policy
(A joint publication of the Environmental Law Society (ELS) of the American University's Washington College of Law and The Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL))
[LEXIS] [WESTLAW]
2. Bureau of National Affairs (BNA) Newsletters
- Current analysis and reporting of domestic and international environmental legislation, case law and regulations
- Full text news articles link to related web sites and documents
- Search by keyword
- Browse by date
- Text and PDF formats
Daily Environment Report (commercial web version)
(Listed Under "BNA Web Notification")
Print: SL3: KF3775 .A15D35 (1993-2002)
Environment Reporter-Current Reports (weekly) (commercial web version)
(Listed Under "BNA Web Notification")
Print: SL3: KF3775 .A6E49 (1970-)
International Environment Report (biweekly) (commercial web version)
(Listed Under "BNA Web Notification")
Print: SL2: K3585.4 .I572 1978 (1987-)
3. Hein Online (commercial web database)
- Full text
- PDF
- Coverage of a journal often extends from volume 1 to date
- Retrieve by citation (volume, journal title, page number)
- Search by author, title or keyword
- Browse by journal title, article title or author
4. LEXIS
LAWREV; ALLREV:
Contains the full text of many law reviews and journals
ENVIRN;ENVLR:
Contains the full text of many environmental law journals and newsletters (Note: To conduct a thorough search for law review and journal articles discussing sustainable growth and development issues, search ALLREV and ENVLR)
ENVIRN; ENVRN:
A collection of environmental law newsletters, including state environmental newsletters, which will provide discussions of state and local sustainable growth issues and initiatives.
News & Business > News:
U.S. national and regional newspapers as well as international newspapers are also sources of information on sustainable growth and development issues.
5. WESTLAW
TP-ALL database:
Contains the full text of many law review and journals, texts and treatises
JLR database:
Contains full text law reviews, journals and CLE course handbooks
ENVNEWS database:
Contains environmental law reviews, texts and bar journals and is a better place to begin a search on
sustainable growth and development issues. As with LEXIS searching, limiting a search to words in the title will retrieve more substantive discussions of a topic.
Business & News databases:
U.S. national and regional newspapers as well as international newspapers are also sources of information on sustainable growth and development issues.
6. E-Journal Finder: TDNet
A research tool that provides links to full text online versions of legal and interdisciplinary journals, periodicals, and newspapers collected by the Jacob Burns Law Library and other GW libraries.