The European Social Survey was initiated and seed-funded by the European Science Foundation, the body representing almost all of Europe's main national academic funding agencies.  Prompting their decision was their realization that most cross-national attitude surveys in Europe at that time were not of sufficient rigour to draw on as reliable sources of knowledge about value change in Europe. 

They therefore created an Expert Group to look into the possibility of starting a new time series on value change that would, as  far as possible, be an exemplar of methodological and substantive rigour.  The Expert Group report was enthusiastic, with the result that two new Committees were then appointed by the ESF to pursue the matter - a Steering Committee under the chairmanship of Professor Max Kaase, which comprised representatives of 21 national academic funding councils, and a smaller Methodology Committee under the Chairmanship of Roger Jowell, which was charged with crafting the structure and design of the proposed new time series.

The two committees produced a joint 'Blueprint', which was subsequently to form the basis of a more detailed application by six of the seven institutions that still form the ESS Central Coordinating team.  The application was successful. 

However, one final hurdle still needed to be cleared.  The EC contribution covered only the project's central design and coordination.  The bulk of the funding - for fieldwork and coordination at a national level - was intended to come from national academic research councils in each participating country.  As it turned out, 22 countries in Round 1, 26 in Round 2, and 25 in R3 agreed to produce the necessary funding, together with a commitment to work within a rigorous centrally-determined specification, and the ESS thus became a multi-funded reality in 2001.