Monday 21 September 2015 was the official launch of a major new social science cluster project – Synergies for Europe’s Research Infrastructures in the Social Sciences’ (SERISS) – funded by the European Commission as part of its Horizon 2020 programme.

The €8.4m project brings together the three leading European Research Infrastructures in the social sciences – the European Social Survey (ESS), based at City University London, the Survey for Health Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) based at MEA in Munich and the Consortium of European Social Science Data Archives (CESSDA) based in Bergen, Norway – with the aim of enhancing their role in evidence-based policy making. Organisations representing the Generations and Gender Programme (GGP), European Values Study (EVS) and the WageIndicator Survey are also involved.

At the launch of the project in London, Director of the European Social Survey European Research Infrastructure Consortium (ESS ERIC) and SERISS Coordinator, Rory Fitzgerald said: “This grant provides a significant boost for European social science. Whether it is an ageing society, climate change, fertility, migration or the future of democracy, the social sciences are critically important in illuminating those issues. By facilitating more effective harmonisation and innovation between social scientists, SERISS will help to ensure they can effectively play their part in those debates.”

"SERISS will develop synergies between existing infrastructures and thus address the key challenge of fragmentation in the social sciences. Furthermore, it will tackle controversial new forms of data such as social media or administrative data from a legal, ethical and qualitative perspective, thus ensuring that the social sciences play an active part in preparing society for the use of new data technologies" (Ivana Ilijasic Versic, Acting Administrative Manager, CESSDA AS).

Download the full press release on the SERISS website.

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Read more about SERISS here.