social science sites of the week

In the news this week see the new classification of social class and our other related class resources.

United Nations historic global arms treaty

This week the Guardian reported on the historic vote in the General Assembly.

Find out more about the UN’s work in this area by consulting the website of the UNODA Department for Disarmament Affairs.  In terms of the arms trade treaty it has a timeline of previous draft resolutions which prepared the path.
There is also a specialist website for the The Final United Nations Conference on the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) held in New York from 18 to 28 March 2013 to conclude negotiations on an Arms Trade Treaty. This has all the key documents, resolutions and media statements plus there are links to the UN reported arms trade database which has recent statistics on reported trade. These include imports and exports, large and small arms from approximately 1992 onwards..
In terms of commentary on the treaty the British government published a comment.
As did pressure groups Oxfam
Campaign against the Arms Trade.
The International Committee of the Red Cross
The Control Arms Campaign has earlier campaigning materials and statements.
Finally another useful site is the Facebook page of the The Monitoring Mechanism towards an Arms Trade Treaty (MMTATT) which links to key UN and NGO documents and sites, including very current ones.

As the Parliamentary Commission on Banking Standards –  issues its waited report on
‘An accident waiting to happen’: The failure of HBOS and volume 2
The UK’s banking regulator, the Financial Services Authority (FSA), has been abolished and replaced with two successor organisations. HM Treasury website includes a collection of documents relating to reforms in UK financial regulation.
The Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) will now ensure the stability of financial services firms and be part of the Bank of England. See more information on its official website.  this includes remit, membership and a growing number of official documents.
The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) is now the City’s behavioural watchdog.
It will have a financial services register and advice for consumers. See this video explaining its role from the BBC. See the response of which? On what they think it ought to do /the the former FSA  website is archived on the UK web archive.

The International Consortium of Investigative Journalists has just released a new project entitled.
Secrecy for Sale: Inside the Global Offshore Money Maze
This seeks to expose the worldwide nature, extent and usage of tax havens
It uses top secret data to reveal the corporations and top countries involved!

A guide to open educational resources
JISC releases basic guide for those wanting an introduction to what open educational resources are, how to find and reuse them. There is also a helpful timeline of the development of OER a directory of useful, links to definitions of OER websites and some great case studies of examples of the benefits of OER materials taken from UK HE very inspirational!

Now available on Gallica more material relating to Zola and Dreyfus
The fabulous online service of the BNF Brouillon now contains the full text of Brouillon
de la lettre adressée par Émile Zola au président de la République, Émile Loubet, relative à l’affaire Dreyfus
Materials relating to Zola and the Dreyfus affair original manuscript from the Bibliothèque de la Cour de cassation, Ms. 455 A protest against the 1900 decision for an amnesty against Dreyfus.
Search gallica for more historic books and docuemnts relating to Dreyfus
For an explanation of this whole event in french history see the French Ministry of culture website.
Dreyfus 
This comprehensive website offers free access to detailed texts describing the time period of the Dreyfus Affair, the principal characters and the legal history. View primary documents from the affair, an extensive bibliography, and a guide to Dreyfus material in the Archives Nationales and the Service des Archives Nationales d’Outre-mer in Aix-en-Provence. Also available are teacher’s guides.
See other a useful list of other related archives via this directory from the University of Pennsylvania
Will  the new benefit changes dismantle the welfare state?
Get key facts on the new changes which came into force this week from the Department of Work and Pensions website. Thin has a key legislative documents section.
Rights net has a useful toolkit of links to legislation, briefings and other resources
Get news coverage and comment from:
The BBC coverage summarizes the changes for the public as well as including news coverage 
Guardian
Independent
The Sunday Times speaks of the moral case for welfare reform.
See the condemnation of the measures in the Mirror which is running a campaign against bedroom tax
And the Sun
Useful summary of responses and coverage from the Huffington Post
Comment from campaign groups include:
National Housing Federation (impact on landlords and tenants0
Disability Rights UK
Child Poverty Action Group
Joseph Rowntree Foundation.
New Policy Institute speaks of the shame of the bedroom tax on its blog  see more on its main blogs
It has also published a paper on the impact of the benefit cuts on families
Mind – mental health
The Institute of Fiscal Studies website has financial calculations of benefit tables find out how much the UK spends and levels.
The Nuffield Trust has modelled  the impact of tax and benefit reforms 2011-2014. The website also has papers discussing the policy.

Finally escape to the sun with these exotic PO vintage online cruise posters.
Which date from the early 20th century to the 1970s. They also have some wonderful photos of locations and life on board.
Remember to look mat the copyright section!