Catalogue description Inter-Departmental Committee on Social and Economic Research

As a result of the report of the Committee on the Provision for Social and Economic Research (Clapham Committee), the Inter-departmental Committee on Social and Economic Research was established in October 1946. The chairman was the Registrar General and the members were drawn from government departments and academic institutions. The terms of reference of the committee were 'to survey and advise upon research work in government departments and in particular to bring to the notice of departments the potential value for research purposes of the material which they collect, to suggest new methods and areas of collection and to advise on how there could be made available to research workers information gathered for their own purposes by the departments which has potential value as material for research.'

Through a number of sub-committees, assisted by co-opted specialists, information collected by departments was surveyed, recommendations for its release to research workers were put forward, and the six volumes of Guides to Official Sources published. In addition, copies of some 3000 unpublished documents were made available in confidence to more than 50 university and specialist libraries.

The committee last met in May 1960; in 1965 the Committee on Social Studies (Heyworth Committee) recommended in its report that it should be dissolved, that its functions should be transferred to a new inter-departmental committee and that the link between government and social scientists outside government should henceforth be through the Social Science Research Council.