"This proposal for a major upgrade to the CESSDA Research Infrastructure is a response to the general principles and vision set out in the 2004 Blueprint for the European Research Obsrvatory for the Humanities and Social Science and will meet the goals set out in that report to ‘strengthen interdisciplinary and cross-border collaboration and comparative research on a European dimension… enhance the building of research infrastructure capacity in the less resourced European countries of today [and]… it will increase the opportunity to improve knowledge on social processes and thus holds great potential in terms of advising European and national policy-makers on how to manage the challenges currently faced by the societies of Europe.’ Building on the existing operational structure of the Council of European Social Science Data Archives (CESSDA) network of data archives and its associated partners, this proposal for a major RI upgrade will seek to address the major gaps and deficiencies identified by the EROHS report on Research Infrastructures through the facilitation of access to and sharing of existing European and national data; the development of improved standards and documentation, and by enabling the linking of cross-national data and the generation of new and genuinely European data for the comparative researcher. Data are the single most important component necessary for a science based understanding of society and to promote and facilitate access to data is to promote research. Although there have been significant advances in recent years in making data available for scientific use, these advances have not bee European-wide. There still remains a large difference in both the actual availability of data as well as in the value that is attached to accessing data across Europe. This proposal will directly address these differences as a precursor to the implementation of an enhanced CESSDA Infrastructure."