In cooperation with the Institute for Political Science (OTKA large-scale project).

ESS was initiated by the European Commission in 2001 in order to gain internationally comparative data biannually on the demographical and social state of European societies, the development of the political and public preferences of the population, and the changes of social attitudes and values influencing actions. The Institute for Sociology and the Institute for Political Science has been a partner since the beginnings, took part in all six waves, so ESS provides an opportunity to map the state of European societies, and to keep track of differences among countries and groups of countries and differences in time. The research database and the full documentation is available for anyone, and can be downloaded at ess.tk.mta.hu.

ESS has been selected to the TOP50 National Research Infrastructures in 2022 and received numberous international awards including Kohli Foundation for Sociology Prize (2024), Lijphart/Przeworski/Verba (LPV) Dataset Award (2020) and the Descartes Prize for Research & Science Communication (2005).

Newest project: 

The joint application with the ESS consortium gained a Horizon 2020 grant in 2019.