ESRC Research Data Policy in a Changing Landscape

The Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) is the UK’s largest funder of economic, social, behavioural, and human data science. ESRC research data policy is ‘intended to support ESRC grant holders who collect, produce and re-use data by defining researchers’ roles and responsibilities, as well as the roles and responsibilities of the ESRC and its data service providers.’ This paper reports on an independent review of this policy, commissioned and funded by the ESRC, and carried out by the authors, to make recommendations for an updated policy in the light of changes to both the data and legal/policy landscape. Following an initial scoping review, the study comprised an online survey of stakeholder views that was followed up by a series of focus groups, and an analysis of a sample of data management plans (DMPs). In this brief report, we concentrate on those aspects of our review, both in process and in substance, which are of most relevance to the data curation and data management community, and outline the next steps in the policy review process.