The James Bonnen papers include reports and other information that Bonnen collected while serving on the Michigan State University (MSU) President's Select Advisory Committee for University Planning and Priorities Committee. The papers also contain a folder of materials collected by Bonnen on the dispute between the College of Agriculture and Natural Resources (CANR) and Provost David Scott over control of the Cooperative Extension Service in the early 1990s.

Also included is material that Bonnen used in his study of land grant universities, and materials related to his time on the President's Council of Economic Advisors under U.S. Presidents Kennedy and Johnson, and on of the National Advisory Committee to the Institute for Research on Poverty at the University of Wisconsin. There are also materials related to his committee work with the American Agricultural Economics Association and the American Statistical Association. There are also files with biographical information about Bonnen as well as files about his work at MSU.

Electronic Resources includes digitized letters and other text documents concerned with James T. Bonnen from around 1949-1954. Included are letters between him and his father, him and Harvard University, as well as a few pages from two papers.