Closing the infrastructure gap: Qualitative data archiving

Over the last 15 years, political science has witnessed a renaissance in qualitative research methods (see, e.g., Brady and Collier, eds., 2010). The canon has been reworked, new areas of scholarship have appeared, and a rapidly expanding body of political science research now employs qualitative and multimethod analysis. Correspondingly, as noted in this symposium's introductory essay on openness dialogue, although qualitative researchers have begun to explore ways to share their data and access those of other scholars, the lack of a dedicated venue or consensual set of practices for storing, sharing, and reusing qualitative social science data in the United States (Heaton 2004: 6) presents a significant obstacle. This infrastructure gap-which transcends scholarly differences over the contributions of qualitative research-contrasts sharply with well-established norm in quantitative research, and with the practices of qualitative social scientist in other countries. As a result of the lack of an appropriate data-sharing venue, the few American social scientists who do share their qualitative data generally do so via inefficient ad hoc arrangements.