50 years of sharing and reusing data in Europe

Because the anniversary is about more than marking a milestone for a network. It marks a shared commitment to an idea that has stood the test of time: that data should be shared and put to use for research, across national borders, disciplines and generations.

From magnetic tape to real-time data platforms

CESSDA stands for Consortium of European Social Science Data Archives. What began as a collegial collaboration has grown into a European Research Infrastructure Consortium – an ERIC – and the only one with its headquarters in Bergen.

Excellent infrastructure is cruical for conducting excellent research.

When the founders of CESSDA met in Amsterdam in May 1976, data archives were working with mainframe computers and magnetic tape. Data was ordered by letter and delivered a month later. The greatest technical risk was dropping a box of punched cards on the floor.

From magnetic tape sent by post to data platforms delivering data in real time – a great deal has happened over these 50 years.

– Excellent infrastructure is cruical for conducting excellent research, said CESSDA Director Bonnie Wolff-Boenisch at the opening of the conference.

– Social science data that is made available and reusable is essential for understanding the society we live in – and for shaping the future we want.

More important than ever

Today, CESSDA is a European research infrastructure with 22 member countries and 12 partners.

At the anniversary conference, the work of the CESSDA network was highlighted as more important than ever. New data sources, technological advances and the emergence of artificial intelligence place great demands on collaboration and innovation.

– Collaboration is not optional – it is the future. No one can address the new opportunities and risks alone, said Vigdis Kvalheim, Director of Research Services at Sikt, in her closing remarks at the conference.

– We must work together to ensure that data remain trustworthy. Trustworthy data sources matter more than ever, and are a precondition for evidence-based policymaking, societal resilience, and democratic accountability.

International collaboration makes national infrastructure stronger

Kvalheim highlighted the microdata.no platform – developed and operated by Sikt in collaboration with Statistics Norway – as a concrete example of what international collaboration has made possible. The platform gives researchers immediate access to registry data from Statistics Norway, without lengthy application processes.

– None of this would have been possible without our long-standing collaboration through CESSDA and the DDI community. That network has been instrumental – technically, professionally, and intellectually – in building a world-class data infrastructure, Kvalheim emphasised.

Kvalheim is no newcomer to the field, having followed it for over 45 years. She drew on the visionary ideas of Stein Rokkan, one of the architects behind both NSD – Sikt's predecessor in this area – and the CESSDA network.

– Stein Rokkan was right: high-quality research, strong national infrastructures, and close international collaboration are inseparable. CESSDA is proof of that, said Kvalheim.

The goal stays the same

Kvalheim has witnessed the field develop from magnetic tape to machine learning. She has seen colleagues across Europe come together – with optimism and remarkable ingenuity – to build an infrastructure that the world needs.

And while the context has changed, the mission has not:

– Open access to high-quality data across national and language boundaries, in service of research that helps society understand and address its greatest challenges. That was the mission in 1976, and it is the mission today, Kvalheim concluded.

Sikt will continue to contribute to this work – as we have done from the very beginning.

Trustworthy data sources matter more than ever, and are a precondition for evidence-based policymaking, societal resilience, and democratic accountability.