Westlaw is an American database providing access to primary and secondary sources for a number of jurisdictions, primarily North America. There are statutes, case law, journals and more.
1. University of the Western Cape
INTRODUCTION TO WESTLAW
Grace Van Niekerk
Law Librarian
gvanniekerk@uwc.ac.za
2. Westlaw is an American database providing access to primary and secondary sources for
a number of jurisdictions, primarily North America.
There are statutes, case law, journals and more.
Overview
3. The EZproxy system will ask you to identify yourself as a UWC student.
It will ask you for a username and password i.e. student number and ID number for South Africans.
Foreign students can use their date of birth as a password. Date of birth starting with the year, then
month and lastly day.
If your month or day is a single digit, you must add a 0 in front e.g. January = 0
Access to the Library’s e-Resources from Off-Campus
4. • Library Login Credentials
• What credentials should I use in order to logon to my UWC library account, or to sign into EZproxy when trying to
access online journals from off campus.
• New Students
• 1st time and First Year UWC students, including students who have been assigned new student numbers when
registering for the 2021 academic year.
• Username: student number e.g. 4112117
• Password (Should contain the prefix !St followed by your ID, or passport number if you’re an international student)
Credentials
5. Returning Students
Username: student number e.g.
4112117
Password (ID number or passport
number for international students)
Staff
Username: initial and surname e.g.
jjones
Password (the network password
that you’ve been using)
Credentials…
• Changing your Password
• If your password doesn’t work or if you need to
change it for whatever reason. You can do so at the
following website.
• https://mypassword.uwc.ac.za
• Problems changing your Password
• If you experience problems resetting your password,
you can contact the ICS service desk via email at
servicedesk@uwc.ac.za (telephone number: 959
2000). Request that the call centre agent assist you
in resetting your network password.
• NB: Changing your password will change your
password for all of the following accounts that you
may use; iKamva.uwc.ac.za, uKwazi library account,
EZproxy, VPN, Intranet
6. How to Access the WestLaw database.
Go to the library’s homepage by using the URL - http://lib.uwc.ac.za/.
Click on the Databases tab in the middle of the page.
You can either select A-Z Databases or Databases by Discipline.
7. Click on the A-Z Databases and select “W” for
“WestLaw”.On the left-hand side you will see WestLaw.
Click on Thomson Reuters Westlaw in the middle of the
page.
8. The home page requires you to read the terms and
conditions and click OK “I agree”, then Continue
9. Westlaw defaults to USA resources. If you want an option,
click on it.
If you are looking for non-American material, click on ‘International materials’ on the right hand side of the screen.
10. The screen will list the Jurisdictions and Content Types. Click on a Country or a Content
Type (which will then list countries). Under the name of a country you will see a list of all
the content. Click on the needed option eg All United Kingdom cases
Searching By Country
11. When you finally get to the option that you want to search in, you will get a screen
that offers you a general search box at the top, or you can use the boxes in the
main part of the screen. These two options allow you to search according to the
information you have. Click search and get a results list.
You will get the details of the document and then sentences from the document indicating where your search terms appear.
To view full text – if available, click on the blue title of the document.
12. Once at the full text of the document, you can copy and paste text and on
the top right hand side are options to print, email, download. It is best to
download. Next to the search box, left hand side, click on the Westlaw log
if you want to get back to the home page to start another search.
13. From the main Westlaw page, right hand side, click on ‘International materials’ and then
at the next screen, right hand side again, click on ‘world journals’.
Finding Journal Articles
14. At the ‘world journals’ screen, you can search by country or use the large search box at the top of the screen to search
all journals. Type in your search terms. Choose the search terms carefully as World Journals is a huge collection and
you don’t want thousands of results. When you get a results list, the left hand column tells you how many results have
been retrieved from American journal, other jurisdictions and the number of results in total. The main part of the
screen presents just a couple of results. Click on All results to see them all if that is what you want.
The results are in relevance order. Your search terms are highlighted.
Again you can click on titles to see full text. Top right of the screen are options to print, download, email etc, You can also
copy and paste.
