Social science sites of the week

This week in the news wikileaks and Ecuador

See our blog entry.
For useful information on Ecuador (and other Latin American nation’s see the LSE Library free subject guide:
Recommended free statistical databases containing basic economic and social indicators for Ecuador include:
United Nations ECLAC Produces the Statistical Yearbook for Latin America and the Caribbean. This contains major economic and social indicators
Inter-American Development Bank Latin America and Caribbean Macro Watch Data Tool -Over 500 indicators consolidating data on macroeconomics, social issues, trade, capital flows, markets and governance.
SICE – the Organization of American State’s Foreign Trade Information System –
Centralizes information on trade policy in the Americas. On the SICE Website, you will find the full texts of trade agreements in force for OAS Member States, new and on-going trade policy developments, information on national trade-related legislation, links to international, regional and national sources of trade policy information and more! SICE, with more than ten years online
PAHO maintains a regional health observatory which has substantial statistics.These cover mortality as well as health care systems.
For those suffering Olympics withdrawal symptoms. Mashable’s visually attractive info graphic on the 2012 social media winners.

SocialBakers, has launched also CheerMeter, a new social media tool that tracks and analyzes real-time global Twitter buzz around sporting events. See its current top 10 for London  follows which sports, athletes and languages are trending on Twitter per hour, per day and over the course of several days

Coming soon Paralympics see the official site for schedules and explanations of athlete categories.
Migration Law Database.
Useful new database maintained by the International Organization for Migration (IOM). Find national, international and regional legislation relating to all aspects of migration including borders, asylum, and detention. Download full text materials of laws, conventions and treaties.
Other features of the IOM website include the statistics contained with the World Migration report (available online from 2000onwards.
Migration profiles of specific nations. There are also useful links to key migration research centres worldwide.

British Bankers’ Association bbalibor.
Free access to one of the measures which has dominated the news recently.
What are libor rates? see the quick guide.
Then access the free historic rates (personal use only) Thomson Reuters sets bbalibor on a daily basis and these rates are available for free on a two month delay for a six month period, in both Excel (.xls) and Text (.txt) format

OstDok – Osteuropa-Dokumente online
OstDok is a joint project of theBayerische StaatsBibliothek, the Collegium carolinum Munich, the Herder-Institut Marburg and the Institute for Eastern and South-Eastern Europe research Regensburg. Originally launched in 2009 it now contains over 1500 items including journal articles, papers and reports, many in full text Topics covered are broad including sciences, humanities and social sciences. Specialist coverage of West European studies including the former Soviet Union, communist and post-soviet studies. Most materials in German only.

Bank of Company Accounts Harmonised (BACH) and European Sectoral references Database (ESD)
Bank of Company Accounts Harmonised (BACH) and European Sectoral references Database hosted by Banque de France. The BACH project was launched in 1985 by the General Directorate for General Economic and Financial Affairs (DGEcFin) of the European Commission.
The BACH database contains information on the financial statements of different sized companies in nine countries (Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal and Spain), aggregated by sector class. Dates covered are currently 1997-2010. Create and export data on assets liabilities and turnover.Consult the user guide for details on coverage and methodology.

Museum of English Rural Life online collections catalogue.
The Museum of English Rural Life (MERL) is based at the University of Reading. It has in recent years engaged in a number of large scale digitisation projects of primary source materials from its archives. Many are now available via the collections catalogue. Most images cover the period 1920-1965 reflecting the economic and social history of the English countryside and rural life during a time of great upheaval. Key projects include: Digitisation of Countryside Images Project which was funded by JISC.  The project digitised and catalogued over 13, 000 glass plate negatives from the Farmers Weekly and Farmer and Stockbreeder photographic collections. The images date from 1920-1965.
New tactics in Human rights
is a project of the is project of the Center for Victims of Torture. It aims to use  technology to
connects the broad human rights community around the world to share experiences, resources and tactical ideas. There is an excellent tactics section which has a resource library of different methods in encouraging community development projects. There is also a Training tools for practitioners. with tutorial materials and online discussion forums. Human rights are defined broadly many of the topics covered include empowerment from a development studies persepctive.