Strengthening links between the ESS and Australia

The director of the European Social Survey (ESS), Professor Rory Fitzgerald, was a keynote speaker at an international conference at the University of Western Australia in Perth on 21-23 February 2018.

The Values Impact Forum brought together researchers, business groups, educators and civil servants who are interested in examining the impact that personal and cultural values have on important social issues.

The Forum was held as part of a series of events to mark the opening of the new Centre for Human and Cultural Values at the University of Western Australia.

The Centre aims to promote the understanding and appreciation of human and cultural values and their impact on important societal issues at the university’s Faculty of Arts, Business, Law and Education.

Another of the keynote speakers at the conference was Professor Shalom H. Schwartz, a member of the ESS Scientific Advisory Board from its inception until 2017. The ESS uses Schwartz’s value theory in each round of the biennial survey.

The involvement of the ESS with the Values Impact Forum is the latest in a series of collaborative links between the ESS and Australia.

Both Fitzgerald and Schwartz have been working with Professor Julie Lee, Director at the Centre for Human and Cultural Values at The University of Western Australia, to help strengthen links between ESS and Australia.

Conference Co-Chair, Lee, attended a global links workshop held by the ESS in London from 11-13 September 2017, with the intention of exploring future links with the ESS.

Funded under the ESS-SUSTAIN project, the workshop brought together the world’s leading cross-national and cross-cultural surveys to explore areas where future collaboration might be possible.