Data access & conditions

European Cooperation in Social Science Data Dissemination

1. CESSDA: The European Network of Social Science Data Archives

When the first European social science data archives were founded in the sixties, social sciences were considered as pure data and infrastructural support for social research was lacking. Of course there were active field research organisations in several countries already and some of the academic institutes had contracted out the data collection for their research projects. Yet there was no culture of data sharing. After all, it was a cumbersome process to archive and ship packages with punched cards across countries and nations. So, it took a while to familiarise the scientific communities with the advantages of sharing data and using it for secondary analysis. Data exchange and repeated use of available data for new research projects intensified with the advent of statistical packages for the Social Sciences and more compact media for data transfer. Magnetic tapes or, later on, diskettes made archiving and data transfer much easier. In addition, training seminars in the uses of secondary analysis and data confrontation seminars for advanced researchers demonstrated the potential for new insights and testing of published results with available data.

Scholars, who participated in those seminars or had a chance to use data provided via the archives, started to deposit their own research data and, thus, contributed to gradually spread the culture of data sharing. Data production and the archival holdings grew, more systematic acquisition policies were implemented and transborder cooperation resulted in exchange of data processing tools and of emerging archiving and service standards.

In the late fifties, there was a discussion, whether just one central archive should serve all scientific communities within Europe. Over the years, most European democracies established their own Social Science Data Services, bearing in mind that linguistic competence, cultural background and familiarity with the needs of the own user community were an essential requirement for a good data service [2]. By that time, the Standing Committees on Comparative Research and on Social Science Data of the International Social Science Council of UNESCO inspired national initiatives to coordinate transborder cooperation¹.

The Council of European Social Science Data Archives (CESSDA) emerged from a meeting of archive directors in Amsterdam on May 31 and June 1, 1976. In agreement with constitutional objectives, CESSDA started to promote the acquisition, archiving and distribution of data for social research throughout Europe to facilitate the exchange of data and technology among data organisations and to support the development of new organisations in sympathy with its aims. Particular emphasis was on the development of standards for study description schemes to inform about the archival holdings, classification schemes for access to variables by subject and continuity guides for coherent data collections. It also was recommended that each archive should inform the scientific community about new acquisitions and activities via its own newsletter. For many years, a central role for information on political data was taken over by EPD, the European Political Data Newsletter, published by the European Consortium for Political Research (ECPR) and the Norwegian Social Science Data Services (NSD). A new initiative, taking up this tradition, is the EURODATA Newsletter, published by the Eurodata Research Archive of the Mannheim Centre for European Social Research (MZES) (http://www.mzes.uni-mannheim.de/eurodata/newsletter/newsletter.html).

Broadening the perspective beyond Europe, the International Federation of Data Organizations (IFDO) was formed in a meeting at Louvain la Neuve on May 22, 1977. While CESSDA and IFDO concentrated on cooperation and data exchange between the data service institutes, IASSIST, the International Association for Social Science Information Service and Technology, promoted the field by cooperation between professionals from libraries and data archives, working in the data service field. When IFDO was created, CESSDA confined itself primarily to projects that could be better pursued within Europe, well aware that the relatively short distances would make travel and communication between project partners much easier. It was clear from the outset that wherever these projects would contribute to the international scientific community beyond Europe, IFDO participation would be welcome and CESSDA also would support IASSIST activities within Europe. When IFDO became associated member of the International Social Science Council, the Standing Committee on Social Science Data was discontinued.

In the seventies and eighties European membership continuously grew and CESSDA started to associate and cooperate with other international organisations sharing similar objectives. Nowadays, the map of Europe shows a good coverage with CESSDA member archives already, while planning processes are under way in several more countries still lacking a social science infrastructure. The organisational network was electronically linked via INTERNET, as depicted in the map created by the Norwegian Social Science Data Services for CESSDA:

Social science data archives in Europe

In this way, the services can easily be accessed from anywhere in the world by clicking the respective archives´ name on the map or by addressing it directly. This allows instant access to available resources from the desk of the researcher, yet the quality and usability of data for comparative research is still to a large extent dependent on what has been originally collected and documented by principal investigators.