vol252 IASSIST Quarterly Summer 2001 11 The Social Research Informatics Center, TÁRKI founded the Social Science Databank in 1985, which was a Consor- tium of different academic and research institutes. The aim of the founders was to create a service-providing center which besides developing the Hungarian empirical sociological research, engaging in research consultancy, and conducting surveys functions as a Databank, that serves the establish- ment of the information basis of the Hungarian social researches and to improve its methodological co-ordina- tion. Since 1992 TÁRKI has its own Survey Department. In 1998 the TÁRKI Incorporation was founded to conduct also profit oriented opinion polls, while the TÁRKI Consortium continues the non-profit data archiving. At present, there are 9 member institutions of the TÁRKI Social Research Informatics Center, which are the follow- ing: • Eötvös Loránd University of Sciences, • University of Szeged; • University of Debrecen; •Hungarian Central Statistical Office, • Budapest University of Economic Studies, • Institute of Political Sciences of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences; • The Sociological Research Institute of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences; • National Institute of Vocational Training; • High School of Nyíregyháza. The Databank has been functioning already since 15 years and its main task is to archive and disseminate data and survey documentation, and also the acquisition of data form other research institutions. At present the Databank contains more than 450, mostly Hungar- ian related, empirical social data sets in SPSS format, suitable for secondary analysis. These data are mostly originated from nationwide representative sample surveys. The archived surveys are conducted by TÁRKI and by other Hungarian research institutes as well. In the Databank the are also some data bases suitable for international comparisons. The users of the Databank can choose from various kinds of topics, such as attitudes, family, social deviance, health care, life-styles, values, consumer patterns, occupations, mobility, ethnic and migrant groups, local governments, stratification, poverty, social policy, social relations, social strata, rural society, religion, elections etc. Data Access Categories A. Free access and dissemination B. Free access for Hungarian researchers and research institutes, for others with the owner’s permission only. C. Free access for the Member institutions of TÁRKI , for others with the owner’s permission only. D. Access with the owner’s permission only (for max. 5 years) The Databank also sells the data. The price of the dataset depends on whether it is simple or aggregate, on the date the survey was conducted and on the status of the pur- chaser. See Table 1 for the current pricelist of the Databank. The Databank also operates different thematic databank sections. The aim of creating these thematic sections is to collect and organize those data sets which belong to the same topic. One of the thematic sections is the Historical Archive, which was built jointly with the Hajnal Istv·n Kˆr (HIK), presently it includes 23 economic and social- historical databases. (http://www.tarki.hu/t_adat/ index.html) TÁRKI Data Bank – The Case of Hungary by Ildiko Nagy 1 12 IASSIST Quarterly Summer 2001 The Women’s Data Archive was established in 2000. It sums up social scientific research projects concerning women and gender issues and thus makes data and publica- tions, a register of researchers and URLs easily accessible. (http://www.tarki.hu/adatbank-h/nok/ index.html) The TÁRKI Databank operates the New Democracies web site, which provides on-line access to the questions and answers from the multinational New Democracies Barometer database. (http:// rs2.tarki.hu:90/ndb-html/) The Databank also publishes and distributes the CD-ROM version of the Hungarian Household Panel surveys conducted between 1992 and 1997. Since the date of its establishment, TÁRKI has been laying emphasis on forming close relationship with the major significant social science data archives of the world. At present it is the member of three international data organizations: IFDO (Interna- tional Federation of Data Organiza- tions), CESSDA (Council of Euro- pean Social Science Data Archives), ICPSR (Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research), ECPR (European Consortium for Political Research). This membership, due to free exchange of data sets between the member institutions, gives the TÁRKI Databank an opportu- nity to make interna- tional databases available for Hungarian users. The Databank also joined the Luxembourg Income Study project and the European Household Panel Network of CEPS/ INSTEAD in Luxem- bourg, and therefore it gives free access to LIS databases for Hungar- ian researchers. These project leading institutions also offer scholarships for researchers interested in international income comparison. Figure 1. Functional structure and staff Archiving, disseminating data; data acquisition Operating TÁRKI's web page International contacts TÁRKI Databank 3 persons TÁRKI's documentations, journals, reports Andorka Library Library 1 person Hardware and software maintenance TARKI Online IT Group 3 persons Social Research Informatics Center Director elpmiS tesatad etagerggA tesatad erofebshtnom21-0detcudnocyevruS 052 0001 erofebshtnom84-31detcudnocyevruS 661 666 erofebshtnom94detcudnocyevruS 48 333 IyrogetactnuocsiD setutitsnihcraeserngieroF snoitaroproccilbupnairagnuH ecirptsilehtfo%66 IIyrogetactnuocsiD snoitutitsnihcraeserrebmem-nonnairagnuH stnedutsngieroF ecirptsilehtfo%33 IIIyrogetactnuocsiD IKRÁTfosnoitutitsnirebmeM stnedutsnairagnuH snoitutitsnihcraeserlanoitanretnI eerF Table 1 Price list of the TÁRKI Databank June 2001 (in USD) IASSIST Quarterly Summer 2001 13 Since 1988 the TÁRKI has been taking part in the International Social Survey Program, there- fore all related international datasets are acces- sible through our Databank. Further international data sets are the East-European comparative surveys, which are conducted by a research foundation consisting of TÁRKI , a Czech and a Polish research institution. The Central European Opinion Research Group (CEORG) CEORG was founded in 1999 and situated in Brussels. A significant part of the revenues of the TÁRKI Databank comes from the support of the TÁRKI Inc. and scientific projects. Since 2001 the Hungarian Scientific Research Fund has been one of the main supporter of the Databank. The membership fees of the TÁRKI member institutions and the data access fees altogether make up only 10% of the annual revenues. The planned total revenues for 2001 is about 58000EUR. The Hungarian social researchers and students of high education are the main user of the TARKI Databank. Future plans and problems The TÁRKI Databank participates in international social science database projects such as the Consortium for Household Panel Studies for European Socio-economic Research (CHER) financed by the European Commission. This project lasts for 3 years between 2000 and 2002 and it aims at harmonizing several national panel studies with the European Community Household Panel. The Databank is going to develop the present thematic sections: the Historical Data Archive and the Women’s Data Archive in 2001. Although the TÁRKI Databank is a public archive it is not supported by the government. Our main problem is connected to the funding of the Databank. Unfortunately TARKI ‘s homepage is just partly available in English, so many information cannot reachable for researcher from abroad. 1. Social Research Informatics Center, TÁRKI Databank, H-1112 Budapest, Budaörsi út 45. Phone: 36-1-309-7693, Fax: 36-1-309-7666, nagyildi@tarki.hu, http://www.tarki.hu Figure 4: Users of TÁRKI Databank in 2000 Figure 3 Revenues of the Databank – Plan for 2001 50% 30% 10% 5 % 5 % TÁRKI Inc. Scientific projects Hungarian Scientific Research Fund Own revenues Membership fees 44% 32% 19% 3% 2% Hungarian students Researchers from member institutions Other Hungarian researchers Researchers from other countries Non-scientific users