Foreign Law Collection
The current emphasis on the internationalization of the curriculum strengthens a long-standing tradition at the Law School of research and teaching in foreign law. Every year, the graduate program brings to the Law School 150 candidates for the LL.M. and S.J.D. degrees, many from outside the United States, who are interested in studying law in a comparative or international perspective. Instruction is offered in the broad disciplines of comparative law, but also in such specialized fields as East Asian law and Islamic law.
The Library supports this emphasis by attempting to acquire the text of the law--both cases and statutes--from every jurisdiction of the world, in the original language of publication. In federal jurisdictions, primary materials are also acquired from jurisdictions below the federal level, but selectively, depending upon the nature of the federal system. Secondary literature is acquired in varying degrees, depending upon the inherent interest of the jurisdiction from the point of view of comparative legal study and the current research interests of members of the Law School faculty and student body. In addition to primary legal materials and their finding aids, the Library subscribes to the periodicals indexed in the Index to Foreign Legal Periodicals and to many other legal periodicals. A wide range of monographs is acquired for many jurisdictions. English-language material concerning foreign law is collected extensively.
Common Law Jurisdictions
The Library maintains extensive research collections for the law of the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Provincial and state primary materials are collected for Canada and Australia. Materials from India, Ireland, Pakistan and South Africa are collected heavily. All other jurisdictions are collected at a moderate level.
Western Europe
The Library is a depository for documents of the European Union and collects materials concerning European Union law extensively. Secondary legal literature from France, Germany, the Netherlands and Switzerland is collected extensively, that from Italy and Spain somewhat less heavily, and materials from the remaining jurisdictions moderately. Official gazettes are acquired for all jurisdictions of Western Europe.
Eastern Europe
Until the collapse of the Soviet Union, materials from that jurisdiction and the other countries of Eastern Europe were collected extensively. The collapse of centralized economic control and the introduction of a market economy in those countries has led to a disruption of the former systems of distribution of publications, and as a result the Library's collections today are not as strong as they were several years ago. The Library attempts to acquire all materials of permanent research value from all of the countries of Eastern Europe, including official gazettes. Materials from the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Russia are collected extensively. Other jurisdictions are collected at a more moderate level.
Latin America
The jurisdictions of Latin America are collected heavily. The Library has accepted primary collecting responsibility within the Research Libraries Group for Brazil, Costa Rica, Honduras and Peru. The Library also collects very heavily in Argentina. For other jurisdictions the Library relies upon other libraries in RLG for specialized materials which it considers to be marginal to its collecting interests.
East Asia
Materials are acquired in the Chinese, Japanese, and Korean languages, and European-language materials about East Asian law are collected extensively. Emphasis is placed upon publications from the People's Republic of China, the Republic of China (Taiwan) and Japan; materials from Korea are collected less heavily. Materials are also acquired from Hong Kong and Macao. Efforts are underway to strengthen the Japanese collection after several years of collecting at a moderate level. Collecting policies are coordinated with the Harvard-Yenching Library; duplication occurs only when materials are required for both collections.
The Middle East and the Islamic World
Until a decade ago, legal publications in the vernacular languages of the countries of North Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia were collected systematically only by the Harvard College Library. Growing interest at the Law School in Jewish legal studies and the establishment of an Islamic Legal Studies Program have led the Library to begin acquiring materials in Arabic, Hebrew, Persian, Turkish, and other languages of the region stretching from Mauritania through Indonesia. Collections of primary and secondary sources related to both the classical and modern periods are being strengthened in collaboration with the College Library. Materials in English and other European languages about Jewish and Israeli law and the law of the Islamic world are collected extensively also. A major new resource, the Boeing Islamic Law Reference Center, was dedicated in 1999.
Ancient, Roman, and Canon Law
The Library's historical collections of Ancient, Roman and Canon law are very strong. These areas are collected extensively today, both to maintain the historic strengths and to support the work of members of the faculty. There is some duplication in Canon law with the Harvard College Library and the Andover-Harvard Theological Library.
Africa
The Library attempts to acquire materials at a research level from all of the countries of Africa. This effort is successful in varying degrees, depending upon publishing and distribution patterns in the various countries. Blanket order arrangements exist with several vendors through which we attempt to acquire materials from across the region.
Other Jurisdictions
Legal materials from the remaining jurisdictions of the world are collected at a level designed to ensure the ability of the collections to support research on major legal topics. Some jurisdictions are less well covered than others are, either because the Library lacks staff with the language skills necessary to select material, because material from the jurisdiction is difficult to acquire, or because a very small amount of legal material is published.
Online access to legal information in foreign law is not so readily available as it is for United States and international law. Materials from the United Kingdom are available in Lexis, as are materials from the European Union. The World Law Index, available through RLG's Eureka service, provides access to summaries of Latin American legislation and, through document delivery, copies of the original texts. Materials from developing countries are increasingly available over the Internet.
The Library depends on inter-library loan partners, primarily members of the Research Libraries Group, for some of its foreign law needs. Special arrangements exist with the library of the University of the West Indies Faculty of Law, in Barbados, for photocopying and faxing Caribbean materials, and with the Swiss Institute of Comparative Law, in Lausanne, for materials from many jurisdictions. Individual members of the Library staff have personal contacts at law collections in other countries, through which copies of materials are sometimes acquired.
The Library's collections relating to the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the Library's Islamic law collection are located in Langdell Hall. Materials for all other foreign countries are located in the International Legal Studies division of the Library in the Lewis International Law Center. Maps and descriptions of the classification schemes used for the collections are available.