How do I find?

Are you looking for a work by a certain author? Do you know the title of a book or would you like to find a book on your research topic? The following search instruments can help you with these questions.

Our Catalogue
In the combined catalogue of both Max Planck Institutes you will find all books, e-books and journal titles located here. You can search the catalogue using a variety of search criteria (e.g. author, title/title catchwords, year, etc.).
Search tips:

• Arch* (when you do not know the exact ending of a term)
• ?ologie (when you do not know the exact beginning of a term)
•  case*law (when you are unsure of the exact spelling)
• “Tax and Law” (when the exact order of terms is to be maintained)
• Button: Contents (Inhaltsverzeichnis) -> makes searches of scanned tables of contents of important works possible

You will find more extensive explanations of the shelf classification system used in each library.

If you were unable to locate a title, please give us an acquisition request. You will be informed as to whether we will acquire the book.
Our Catalogue
 

Catalogues of Other Max Planck Institutes
Here you will find a listing of all Aleph Online Catalogues, amongst others those of the Max Planck Institutes with a legal or economics orientation. Should you find a needed title there, it may potentially be borrowed short-term from another Institute, or you may send us an acquisition request.
Catalogues of Other Max Planck Institutes
 

Karlsruhe Virtual Catalogue – (Karlsruher Virtuelle Katalog ) KVK
The Karlsruhe Virtual Catalogue (Karlsruher Virtuelle Katalog) makes possible worldwide metasearches in the collections of national libraries, library associations and booksellers’ lists. Literature found here can be borrowed through the Bavarian State Library (Bayerische Staatsbibliothek) by way of an inter-library loan. In addition, you may send us an acquisition request. You will be informed as to whether we will acquire the book.
Karlsruhe Virtual Catalogue (KarlsruherVirtueller Katalog - KVK)

WorldCat
WorldCat lists the titles of over 10,000 libraries in various languages from all countries of around the world, and is thereby the world’s largest bibliographic collection database.

Literature found here can be borrowed through the Bavarian State Library (Bayerische Staatsbibliothek ) by way of an inter-library loan. In addition, you may also send us an acquisition request. You will be informed as to whether we will acquire the book.
WorldCat

Google Books
“Google Books” is a service of the internet provider Google, which has the objective of making the contents of millions of books available worldwide, primarily through digitisation for full text searches. Google Books is supplied from two sources: Google Print in a strict sense, which is a no-longer controversial cooperation project with publishers; and the still legally controversial “Google Library”, whereby large numbers of primarily academic books are scanned even without the permission of the right holders.
Google Books

Various platforms are available for the targeted search for electronic books:

Our Catalogue
E-books are indicated by a “green point” in the hit list.

Otherwise, we make an effort, according to the library’s collection profile, to license electronic books and to list e-books from the database offering. These e-books are indicated by a “yellow point” in the hit list and are only accessible from within the Institute’s IP address area.
Our Catalogue
 

E-book Catalogue of the Max Planck Society
This is a catalogue of e-books licensed by the Max Planck Society. The following are of particular interest:

• Brill Nijhoff E-Books Collections
• DeGruyter ReferenceGlobal
• The Digital Collection of Private Law of the MPI for European Legal History 
• Duncker & Humblot
• Encyclopedia Britannica
• The Max Planck Encyclopedia of Public International Law
• Oxford English Dictionary
• Oxford Reference Online
• SourceOECD
• Springer
• Wiley Online Books
• WISO E-books

E-Books Catalogue of the Max Planck Society

E-book Offering of the Max Planck Society’s – MPG.ReNa
MPG Re.Na provides you with a comprehensive overview of all e-books centrally licensed by the Max Planck Society.
MPG.ReNa

E-books in Beck-Online
You will find several hundred e-books in the Beck-online database of the publisher C.H. Beck. The most important e-books of relevance for our Institute are also listed in our library’s catalogue.
Beck-online

E-books in Jurion
Here you will find a series of commentaries and reference works. For example, this database contains the German Income Tax Commentary by Paul Kirchhoff or the German Civil Code Commentary by Erman.
Jurion

E-books in LEGIOS
LEGIOS is a cooperation between juris and the publisher Dr. Otto Schmidt on the topics of business and tax law. It links the publisher’s renowned commentaries, journals and handbooks with the well-prepared decisions and legislation by juris.
LEGIOS

E-books with National Licenses
Since 2004, in order to improve the long-term supply of electronic information to German universities, research institutions and academic libraries, the German Research Association (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft – DFG) has financed the acquisition of national licenses. The objective is to provide academics, students and academically interested private individuals access to databases, digital text collections and electronic journals free of charge. The offering of these national licenses is accessible from within the Max Planck Institute’s IP address area. This database site offers comprehensive search possibilities for over 16 of the e-book and text collections financed by the DFG with a total of more than 387,000 titles. You can find an overview of all resources supported within the context of the national licenses programme here.
National licenses

Google Books
“Google Books” is a service of the internet provider Google, which has the objective of making the contents of millions of books available worldwide, primarily through digitisation for full text searches. Google Books is supplied from two sources: Google Print, which is in a strict sense a no longer controversial cooperation project with publishers; and the legally controversial Google Library, whereby large numbers of primarily academic books.
Google Books

Are you looking for databases such as, for example, Beck-online, Westlaw or ScienceDirect from Elsevier? The database site DBIS  offers extensive information about, and access possibilities to, individual databases. Licensed databases are accessible only from within the Institute’s IP address area.

The databases of greatest importance for the Institute are listed in these database sites:

• Beck-online
• Business Source Premier
• Elsevier ScienceDirect
• HeinOnline
• Jurion
• Juris
• KluwerCompetitionLaw
• LEGIOS
• LexisNexis
• Making of Modern Law
• Source OECD
• Springer Link
• Westlaw International
• WISO Economics

DBIS – Database Information System
This cooperatively managed administration system makes it possible to quickly find academic databases. Currently, there are approx. 9,000 databases listed, of which around one third are freely available.

You can find a specific database under “Search for Database”.
The subject overview makes it possible for you to acquire an overview of databases on a specific subject.
Similar to the electronic journals library (EZB), access rights are given according to the traffic signal method:

Free in the internet
Licensed access
D freely accessible throughout Germany (DFG-funded national license)
DBIS

MPG Re.Na - Max Planck Navigator
MPG Resource Navigator is a web application to navigate through scientific information resources available to staff and guests of the Max Planck Society.

It includes licensed databases, digital collections, and reference works. In addition, recommandable retrieval tools available on the web free of charge are part of the collection. Moreover, almost all Max Planck Institute library catalogs, as well as selected external ones, are accessible from here.
MPG Re.Na

Do you have a reference from a bibliography, or are you looking for a specific journal in either print or electronic form? Or would you just like to know if a particular journal is available in the library?

Our Print Journals
Here you will find an alphabetic listing of all subscribed journals available in the library.
Journal list of the Innovation and Competition Library
Journal list of the Tax Law and Public Finance Library
 

Electronic Journal Library (EZB)
The electronic journal library is a cooperative service of more than 550 libraries. The objective is to provide users easy access to electronically published academic journals that offer their articles in full text. A simple traffic signal system will show you if a desired journal is freely available, is licensed for the Institute or is available in electronic form but not licensed.

The EZB contains, amongst other things, the journal titles of Beck-online, HeinOnline, JSTOR and WISO.

Due to the database structure of some providers, it is unfortunately not possible to list all electronic journals available in our library in the EZB. Thus, for example, you will not find Westlaw or LexisNexis journals in the EZB.
EZB
 

Journal Database (ZDB)
The journal database is the world’s largest database for title and ownership listings of sequential collected works such as journals and newspapers. The ZDB contains more than 1.5 million titles in all languages from the year 1500 to the present. Article titles are not listed.
ZDB

Are you looking for a specific article in a journal?

Our Catalogue
Our catalogue only allows you to search for printed journals in which an article has appeared.

You may, however, enter your reference in the MPG Citation Linker, and you will receive information as to whether electronic access is available or in which Institute the journal is available in which the article was published.

Are you looking for a specific article in a collected edition (conference publication, etc.) or in a commemorative book (Festschrift)?
Articles in collected editions and commemorative books may be searched for by selecting the search field “Contents”. Currently approx. 26,000 tables of contents have been scanned for searches and are available. Included, amongst others, are all commemorative books and collected editions available at the library.
Our Catalogue
 

Online Contents Law
The OLC Law database is a subject-related excerpt of the Swets database Online Contents. Since 2006, expansion of OLC Law has been supported by the German Research Association (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft) in the context of the special site Virtual Law Library. The contents of OLC SSG Law are administered by the special collecting department jurisprudence of the Berlin State Library – Prussian Cultural Heritage. From the Latin-American area of law, 88 journals are obtained from the Online Contents – SSG Latin America.

Currently more than 800 journals are being evaluated. You can find an overview of the evaluated journals here. This database, which is updated weekly, currently contains approx 1.2 million articles and reviews on national and international law and is available within the Institute’s IP address area. Via Citation Linker (SFX), one has direct access to the full text of articles from the database, as long as the journal is licensed for the Institute.
Online Contents Law

Online Contents Economic Sciences
The database OLC-SSG Economics is a subject-related excerpt of the Swets database Online Contents which is continually expanded with selected journals from the online database ZBW – the German Central Library for Economics, the Leibniz Information Centre and the university library of the Helmut Schmidt University, Armed Forces University of Hamburg.

The database contains the tables of contents of 2,400 journals in the special collection areas of national economics, business administration and business sectors, and currently lists approx. 2.7 million articles and reviews
You will find an overview of evaluated journals here.

The database is available from within the Institute’s IP address area. Via Citation Linker (SFX), one has direct access to the full text of articles from the database, as long as the journal has been licensed by the Institue.
Online Contents Economic Sciences

Additional Search Possibilities
The following databases offer primarily publisher-based access to articles or, as in the case of Juris, list a source:

• Beck-online
• Business Source Premier
• Elsevier ScienceDirect
• HeinOnline
• Jurion
• Juris
• Kluwer Online
• LEGIOS
• LexisNexis
• Making of Modern Law
• Source OECD
• Springer Link
• Westlaw International
• WISO Economics

Detailed information on the contents of the listed databases and an abundance of other databases, as well as access possibilities, can be found on the database sites DBIS and MPG.ReNa.

Google Scholar
Google Scholar is Google’s search engine for academic publications. The emphasis is on professional journals, however, full texts subject to a charge can also be found.
You will find additional information regarding Google Scholar here.
Google Scholar

Under Which Conditions May I Use the Library?
The library of the Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition and the Max Planck Institute for Tax Law and Public Finance is open to all users with an academic interest in the Institutes’ respective research areas. Prerequisites for using the library are prior registration and participation in a library tour.

May I Order the Library’s Literature through an Inter-Library Loan, or Ask for Copies?
The library of both Max Planck Institutes is a reference library and is not connected to inter-library loans. Furthermore, it is not possible to fulfil copy requests. In addition, due to licensing terms, the library’s electronic information offering is only available to authorised library users.

How Do I Search for Literature Available in the Library?
All literature available in the library is listed in our catalogue. You will find more detailed help on the library’s entire information offerings at literature search or answers to individual questions at "How do I find …”.

How Do I Find the Location of a Book?
When you have found a title in our catalogue, you can determine the location from the call number. The call number is displayed in the hit list or the full view of a title.

In this regard, please note the following:
You will find literature with the location “Intellectual Property Law” on the ground floor and/or the basement of the Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition at Marstallplatz 1. You will find literature with the locations “Tax Law” or “Public Finance” at Marstallstr. 8. You will find the literature of the MIPLC in the basement of the Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition.

You will find the desired title in the library within the shelf classification.

Shelf Classification of the Innovation and Competition Library
Shelf Classification of the collection “Business and Tax Law”
Shelf Classification of the collection “Public Finance”
Shelf Classification of the MIPLC library

The listings of literature in the library “Innovation and Competition”, in the library “Business and Tax Law” and in the MIPLC library are based on a categorisation according to countries or groups of countries. You will find the corresponding country codes here.

How Can I Search for Literature According to Content Criteria?
Since mid-2008, the tables of contents of all new books of the library have been scanned and indexed in full text for searches in our catalogue. You may use this function by selecting the search field “Contents” and adding the text in the search field. Currently approx. 26,000 tables of contents are available for searching. The literature of the library “Innovation and Competition” is also accessible with regard to content based on a classification system.

May I Borrow Books or Journals?
The library is a reference library. Only academics and scholarship holders who have an office in one of the Institutes may borrow media for their offices. The regulations of the library’s terms of use apply to these persons. The library’s guests who were assigned a locker for the duration of their stay may borrow media and store it in their locker. Removing media from the building is not permitted under any circumstances.

How Can I Tell if a Book Has Been Borrowed, and What Can I Do in This Case?
Whether or not a book is borrowable is shown in our catalogue in full view mode, in the column exemplar status. If an entry is listed as "For Loan" and "On Shelf" (the latter in the due date column), the book may be borrowed. If you see a date there, then the book is checked out until this date. Should you require a borrowed book prior to the end of the loan period, then you may have a reservation made at the library’s information desk. The book will be available for you within a few days.

What Can I Do if Literature Is Unavailable in the Library?
If you are unable to find needed literature in either print or electronic form in the library, then it is possible to borrow books from the Bavarian State Library (Bayerische Staatsbibliothek) or to order books via inter-library loan. You may order articles via the service subito. You may also submit an acquisition request at any time.
 
May I Access the Library’s Electronic Information Offering from My Laptop?
As long as you have been assigned a locker due to the length of your stay, internet access may be set up for you. You will have access, within the Institute, to available information and databases. In this regard, please contact the library’s information desk.

May I Receive Internet Access for My Laptop?
Day guests may receive a user ID and password from the library’s information desk, in order to connect to the WLAN. This data changes at the beginning of each week. This connection does not allow you to access the Institute’s database offerings.

What Equipment Is Available at the Library?
All workspaces are equipped with an electrical outlet.
In addition, each library has several search PCs, which provide access to our catalogue and to our licensed databases.
Furthermore printers are available to you to print out search results.
Copy machines with scanning capability are available in each library. To use the copy machines, you must purchase a copier card. Copier cards are available from the vending machine in the foyer of the Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition.