Candidate Countries Eurobarometer Survey Series

In October 2001, the European Commission launched a new series of surveys in the 13 countries that are applying for European Union membership under the heading Candidate Countries Eurobarometer (CCEB). Initially named Applicant Countries Eurobarometer (or AC-EB) the surveys were ordered and co-ordinated by the Directorate-General for Press and Communication (Public Opinion Analysis). The CCEB surveys are carried out in Bulgaria, Republic of Cyprus (with a separate northern Cyprus survey parallel to 2002.2), Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, and Turkey. After a four year gap the CCEB is replacing the former Central and Eastern Eurobarometer. The CCEB surveys gather information from the societies applying to become members of the EU in a way that is comparable with the Standard Eurobarometer. The methodology used is almost identical to that of Standard Eurobarometers. Every survey is carried out on national representative samples of around 1000 respondents aged 15 and over in each country, except Malta and Cyprus where the samples are of 500 respondents, using face-to-face interviewing at the respondents' home. The national samples reflect the structure of population aged 15+ in terms of gender, age, regions of a country, settlement size, education level, and marital status. In each of the 13 candidate countries the surveys are carried out by national institutes associated with and coordinated by the Hungarian office of The GALLUP Organization in Budapest and GALLUP-Europe in Brussels.