Guide to Finding and Citing United Nations General Assembly Resolutions.
by Annette Demers 11/10/2018
1. Normally you will find a preliminary citation as you are reading books, articles or websites on your topic. You should note that many of these citations are not complete
for proper citing purposes.
2. According to the McGill Guide, a proper citation to a UNGA Resolution must be made to the Resolution as it appears in the Official Record. A proper citation to a UNGA Resolution looks like this:
Universal realization of the right of peoples to self-determination. GA Res. 38/16, UN GAOR, 38th Sess., Supp. 47, U.N. Doc. A/38/47 (1983) 184.
The type of information referred to in the above citation is as follows:
Title of resolution, resolution number, UN General Assembly Official Records (UN GAOR), session, supplement number, UN document number of the supplement, year, page number of the supplement on which the resolution is reprinted.
3. Where do you find all of these elements?
a) Title of resolution, resolution number, session and year
Most citations in books and journal articles will include at least this information. This information is readily available on the UNGA website, which is organized by year:
b) Supplement number, UN document number, page number
These pieces of information can be very tricky to locate. Locate the document entitled "Resolutions and Decisions Adopted by the General Assembly During its ______Session"
for thesession you are interested in.
Most of these documents can be found using the United Nations Optical Disk System. This is a free online database of United Nations Documents. It is located at:
When searching this database, it is important to be sure that you are searching all UN documents. To do so, use the drop down menu on the upper left corner. Your search should include the Session number, in the Session field, and the word "Resolutions" in the Title field. This will normally bring up the document you need, however more creative searches may be required, as the ODS system can be very clunky.
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Once you have located the document you need, click on "English pdf" to see the full-text.
Warning: Document load times from ODS can be prohibitive.
The first page of the document will give you the year, the supplement number, and the UN Document number for the supplement.
Next you have to find what page your resolution appears on. Scroll through the Table of Contents. At the bottom of it, you will be given a page number where the Index to Resolutions and Decisions may be located. Turn to that page. You will have to scroll through the Index to locate your resolution. Its page number is listed on the right. Scroll to that page to verify that it is located there.
Alternatively, it is important to note that when you click on the full-text of most UNGA resolutions using the free UN website
-the document you pull up will be the exact page upon which the resolution is printed
in the supplement. In other words, the free UN website is linking you directly into the content of the supplement off the ODS system. Unfortunately, the front page of the pdf is not provided by this method, thus you cannot find the supplement number and document number by merely visiting the free UN site.
4. Common mistakes:
The most common mistake that appears in citations to UN Resolutions in journal articles, is that the UN Document number provided, is usually the Resolution number and not the document number for the supplement. Both are required. Often, the supplement number is also not given. A citation which includes the acronym UN GAOR tells the reader that you are giving them a citation to the actual Official Record. Thus do not use UN GAOR as part of your citation if you have not actually looked at the supplement itself and are not able to provide a supplement number and document number for the supplement.
As always, please be sure to visit the Reference desk if you have any further question.
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