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 AU Library Subject guides Political Science Statistics and data

Statistics and data

Opinions and attitudes

  • Afrobarometer
    Afrobarometer is non-partisan, pan-African research institution conducting  public attitude surveys on democracy, governance, the economy and society in Africa. Free access to data. 
  • Asian barometer survey
    The Asian Barometer Survey (ABS) is an applied research program that aims to gauge public opinion on issues such as political values, democracy, and governance across Asia. Access to data must be applied for.
  • The Danish National Election Study (in Danish and English)
    The Danish National Election Study has made national, representative voters researches after each Parliament election since 1971. The main purpose with the researches is to cover the main reasons to why the voters vote as they do.
  • Danske vælgere 1971-2019 (only in Danish)
    An overview over the development in the voters’ opinions etc., 4. edition, 2020. By Rune Stubager, Kasper Møller Hansen og Jesper Sommer Jensen.
  • Eurobarometer
    The Eurobarometer contains opinion polls that have been conducted regularly on behalf of the European Commission and other EU institutions since 1973. The reports cover a wide range of topics and there are fact sheets with key indicators for each country.
    Datasets can be downloaded from the EU Open Data Portal.
  • European Social Survey (ESS)
    The European Social Survey (ESS) is an academically driven cross-national survey that has been conducted every two years across Europe since 2002. The ESS measures the attitudes, beliefs and behaviour patterns of diverse populations in more than thirty European nations.
  • Gallup
    Gallup is an international analysis agency that conducts random surveys of the population's opinions (Gallup surveys).
  • General Social Survey
    The General Social Survey (GSS) is a nationally representative survey of adults in the United States conducted since 1972. The GSS collects data on modern American society to monitor and explain trends in opinions, attitudes, and behaviors.
    Data can be accessed via GSS Data Explorer.
  • International Social Survey Programme (ISSP)
    This is a continuing annual programme of cross-national collaboration on surveys covering topics important for social science research.
  • Meningsmålingsarkivet (NSD - in Norwegian)
    The Norwegian Center for Research Data provides access to the Polling Archive, which is a collection of Norwegian polls conducted from 1964 to 2011.
    Note: No access at this time. Expected to reopen later in 2023.
  • NatCen
    The National Center for Social Research is England's largest research and analysis center in social research. Publishes the British Social Attitudes Survey annually.
    Access to data via the UK Data Archive.
  • Pew Research Center
    The Pew Research Center is an impartial fact tank that informs the public about the issues, attitudes and trends that create the world. Partial access to data.
  • Rigsarkivet (The Danish National Archive) - (in Danish and English - most data in Danish)
    A collection of data and documentation from studies of subjects within the field of social science, health science and history. Eg. The Danish values survey 1981-2017.
    See also Archives Portal Europe, which provides access to European archive institutions.
  • Surveybank.aau.dk 
    Surveybank.aau.dk is an online databank for surveys, and it is based on the Danish election surveys and the Danish ISSP-surveys. Surveybank.aau.dk enables you to describe and analyse the attitudes and behaviour of the Danish people.
  • Swedish trends 1986-2020 
    Every year, the SOM Institute (Society, Opinion, Media) at the University of Gothenburg performs a survey of Swedes' attitudes towards selected subjects.​
  • World Values Survey 
    The World Values Survey (WVS) is a global network of social scientist studying changing values and their impact on social and political life. The WVS is the largest non-commercial, cross-national, time series investigation of human beliefs and values.

Political data

  • Comparative Agendas Project
    This is a website with entrance to information and data about political agendas (parliamentary debates, media etc.). You can find links to the different countries’ agendas projects.
  • Comparative Constitutions Project
    The aim of this project is to examine sources and the consequences of constitutional choices. The researchers collect and analyse data about the formal characteristics for written constitutions, both current and historical, for most independent states since 1789.
  • Comparative Welfare Entitlements Dataset (CWED)
    CWED contains information about social rights in 33 countries around the world.
  • Databanken (in Danish)
    An overview of data sources within the subject areas of a bachelor's degree programme in Political Science at Aarhus University. There are data sets within General Political Science, International Politics, Public Administration, Public Policy, Political Institutions, Comparative Political Science and Political Sociology.        
  • KOF Globalization Index
    The site contains data for 207 countries over the period 1970-2013. The KOF index measures the three main dimensions of globalization: economic, social and political.
  • Manifesto Project Database
    A project based on quantitative content analyses of parties’ electoral manifestos from more than 50 countries, and it covers all free, democratic elections since 1945.    
  • OECD iLibrary (in English and French)
    The database provides access to a large amount of publications and statistics that illustrates economic and social subjects within, e.g. macroeconomics, international trade, education, employment, development and research. The content is available in full text.    
  • ParlGov.org
    ParlGov contains information about votes, government compositions and other parliamentary matters in all of the EU and most of the OECD democracies (37 countries) from 1945 until today. The database combines approximately 1,500 parties, 910 elections and 1,400 cabinets. 
  • Social Expenditure Database (SOCX) (in English and French)
    OECD Social Expenditure Database includes reliable and internationally comparable statistics on public, mandatory and voluntary private social expenditure at programme level. SOCX provides a unique tool for monitoring trends in aggregate social expenditure in areas such as old age, health, family, active labour market programmes, unemployment, housing, and other social policy areas.
  • V-Dem (in English, French, Spanish and more)
    Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem) is a new approach to conceptualising and measuring democracy. It covers all countries (and some independent territories) from 1900 to the present, whenever possible.

National/international statistics databases

  • Danmarks Statistikbank/StatBank Denmark (in Danish and English)
    StatBank Denmark contains detailed official statistical information on the Danish society.
  • Eurostat (in English, French and German)
    Eurostat is the statistical office of the European Union situated in Luxembourg. Its task is to provide the European Union with statistics at European level that enable comparisons between countries and regions.
  • Statistik fra andre lande (the website is in Danish, links are in English)
    Links to statistics from other countries through the website of Danmarks Statistik/Statistics Denmark.
  • World Development Indicators
    Statistics from the World Bank. WDI includes all of the World Bank’s member countries as well as all other economies with more than 30,000 inhabitants. 
Revised 12.04.2024