About Us

The New Zealand Social Science Data Service was set up in August 2007, with the help of Australian Social Science Data Archive (ASSDA) staff and of the Broadband-enabled Science and Technology GRID (BeSTGRID). At inception, the service’s holdings represented 15 survey data sets, from the area of politics.

 

Funding

The first year of NZSSDS’s development is part of Tertiary Education Committee (TEC) - funded research project, entitled “Developing a hub for e-Social Science in NZ: Linking the GRID with emergent social data technologies and networks”. More information about the project’s intents can be found on the New Zealand Social Statistics Network (NZSSN) website.

 

Management and governance

NZSSDS is administered from within the Social Statistics Research Group (SSRG) at The University of Auckland, headed by Professor Peter Davis. A stakeholders' committee has been set up for the data service, with members as listed below. As the service grows, we expect other institutes and organisations may join this committee and/or play a larger support role in the data service.


Stakeholders

  • Professor Peter Davis (chair) - SSRG/Sociology, The University of Auckland
  • Dr Henry Barnard - Social Anthropology, Massey University
  • Professor Richard Bedford - BRCSS/Geography, The University of Waikato
  • Associate Professor Paul Bonnington - BeSTGRID/eResearch, The University of Auckland
  • Janet Copsey - Library, The University of Auckland
  • Professor Charles Crothers - Social Sciences, Auckland University of Technology
  • Hamish James - Statistics New Zealand
  • Daniel Patrick - Nga Pae, The University of Auckland
  • Professor Alastair Scott - Statistics, The University of Auckland
  • Professor David Thorns - Sociology, University of Canterbury
  • Professor Jack Vowles - Politics, University of Exeter

 

About our collaborators

  • The New Zealand Social Statistics Network (NZSSN) assists in the development of quantitative social science research in the academic, government and private research sectors. The network is administered by the NZSSDS team, and runs seminars, workshops and summer short course programmes in research methods and technology. Visit the NZSSN website for more information.
  • The Australian Social Science Data Archive (ASSDA) was set up in 1981, to collect and preserve computer-readable data relating to social, political and economic affairs and to make the data available for further analysis. In 2007, it reached 2000 data sets archived. ASSDA provided NZSSDS’s very first data sets, having been custodians thereof in the absence of a New Zealand data archive since 1996. Visit the ASSDA website for more information.

  • The International Association for Social Science Information Service & Technology (IASSIST) is an organisation of professionals working in and with information technology and data services, aiming to support research and teaching in the social sciences. Visit the IASSIST website for more information.