IRELAND

The results are at once revealing and significant. For the most part,
Europeans reported high levels of life satisfaction, though variations could
be observed both across countries and between regions within countries.
By linking this ESS data with that available for SO 2 levels, Brereton and
his colleagues were able to demonstrate a significant correlation between
air quality and life satisfaction. In short, they showed that Norway and
Denmark, the countries which had the lowest SO 2 concentrations, were
also those with the highest levels of life satisfaction. Moreover, they were
able to show a clear connection between increases in SO 2 levels and
decreases in life satisfaction.
Such findings, unreachable without reference to the survey’s core
research, present obvious, clear-cut challenges to policy-makers. Yet,
according to Brereton, the next key phase in the development of the ESS
will be the push to ensure its greater use in the formation of public policy
and presentations to this effect have already been made in the European
Parliament. If this is to be achieved, however, it will be crucial that the
retreat from participation among certain countries, a consequence of the
international financial crisis, can be reversed. The problem is real: where,
at its peak, participation in the ESS spread to thirty-one countries, it has
shrunk to twenty-three countries for certain crisis-era modules.
Ireland has never been inclined to withdraw – and with good reason. It’s
not just that the ESS enjoys the prestigious status of a European Research
Infrastructure Consortium (an ERIC) to which Ireland is a signatory or
even that it won the Descartes Prize, awarded by the European
Commission for ‘excellence in scientific research’ in 2005, the first social
science project to win this prize. It’s also that with almost 80,000
registered users of the data worldwide, Ireland, whose participation is
funded by the Irish Research Council, is one of the highest per capita
consumers of survey content. This pattern of heavy usage is unlikely to
change anytime soon. If anything, indeed, demand is set only to increase.
A defining feature of the ESS is that it offers a ‘time series’ the effect of
which, Finbarr Brereton emphasis, is that ‘the more you stay involved, the
more valuable it becomes’.
That future value is at once clear and uncertain. For if past experience is
any guide, it is that core research undertaken by ESS will, most likely
through linkages with other datasets, open new fields of inquiry and
throw up fresh and unplanned insights.
What it set out to do – and what it has
undoubtedly delivered – is the production
of important new, fundamental knowledge
that allows for proper comparisons
between countries across a Europe that is
remarkable for its diversity – of people,
languages, attitudes, beliefs, opinions and
experiences.
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