Name: Czech National Node of the ESS (European Social Survey)
Institution: Institute of Sociology of the Czech Academy of Sciences
Coordinator: Mgr. et Mgr. Klára Plecitá, Ph.D.; klara.plecita@soc.cas.cz
Website
ESS-CZ is the Czech national node of the ESS ERIC (European Social Survey) European research infrastructure. ESS ERIC undertakes international quantitative surveys of the socio-demographic characteristics of people living in European countries and their opinions on current social issues (e.g. immigration, climate change, energy, democracy, economic morality, criminal justice, economic justice and social policy). The surveys take place every two years with the view to obtaining comparable data from European countries so that researchers, educators, politicians, journalists, the public administration, local governments and the general public can analyse and understand the similarities and differences between European societies. Open access to the data from ESS ERIC surveys is provided and registered users can download datasets from the online data archive of the Norwegian Social Sciences Data Service or analyse them online in the NESSTAR system. ESS ERIC is one of the leading projects implemented under the European Research Area. In 2005, it was the first social sciences and humanities project with Czech participation to be awarded the European Commission’s Descartes Prize. The main goals of ESS ERIC include mapping the stability and dynamics of social structures, maintaining and disseminating high standards of international comparative research in the social sciences and humanities, introducing plausible indicators of European countries’ national development as it is perceived and evaluated by their
populations, and implementing and supporting professional education of European researchers. ESS ERIC publishes the basic findings of its studies in the form of the ESS Topline Series, facilitates e-learning through its ESS EduNet platform and maintains a bibliographic database, ESS Bibliography. Furthermore, it publishes national and international integrated datasets and provides for comparative analyses of countries in time (2002-2018). In the Czech Republic, ESS-CZ issues press releases and scholarly publications. At the international level, ESS ERIC collaborates with other European research infrastructures and projects, especially with SHARE ERIC (Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe), CESSDA ERIC (Consortium of European Social Science Data Archives), GGP (Generations and Gender Programme), EVS (European Values Study) and the WageIndicator Survey.
