Several forms of collaboration can be found in the activities of these repositories. These forms can be roughly divided into four groups: collaboration predominately with users, with data providers, with other repositories, or with more integrated communities involving many types of agencies. The practices in each form of collaboration are sufficiently different to deserve separate discussion.

Collaboration with users can itself take several forms. NASA involves users in collaboration to provide access to its own and many other repositories of related data. This is done primarily through maintaining and improving metadata in its Global Change Master Directory (GCMD). The GCMD is NASA’s directory of earth science and climate change data and services, which indexes contents and provides metadata for approximately 2000 data centers throughout the world. The linked centers maintain their own listings and metadata on line, through a database management application. This helps ensure more accurate and current listings. A different form of collaboration with users is found in the Zentral Archive’s European Data Laboratory. The Archive obtained EU funding to establish an access and analysis laboratory in which researchers can collaborate with each other and Archive staff on projects. The laboratory effort led to the establishment of the Collaborative Study of Electoral Systems, involving researchers from over 30 countries. Collaboration of the New Zealand Ministry of Justice takes the form of participation with users and data providers on the development and maintenance of systems and data sets. This form of collaboration appears to fit well with the justice domain, since the users and providers are typically the same agencies. Collaboration in the governance and operation of the repository itself is also seen in the ICPSR, but in a voluntary setting. The Consortium is a member-governed organization of over 500 colleges and universities. The operation is governed by a 12-member board (Council) of researchers elected from the consortium members, and working committees. This arrangement represents collaboration in a research domain in which the providers and users are often the same individuals and organizations.

Collaboration among providers was illustrated in work among Federal agencies on matters of data privacy and security. The NCES collaborated with other Federal statistics agencies to sponsor legislation facilitating data sharing among Federal agencies. However as of this writing, the legislation has not passed. NCES also has taken a leadership role in collaboration with other Federal repositories on policies and practices to deal with privacy and confidentiality concerns. Those practices are described in more detail in the section below on data confidentiality.

Collaboration among the users, providers, and information repositories linked to the USDA is unique among the agencies we studied. There is a very high level of many kinds of collaboration reported among the organizations involved in agriculture research and data activities. The various forms of collaboration we found are part of long-standing institutional relationships among the USDA units, agriculture extension agencies at the state and local levels, universities and research centers, and agriculture producers. These institutional relationships have their roots in the creation of the land grant colleges under the 1862 Morrill Act, with their agricultural research and education mission to the farming community. The Federal relationship with those colleges and their local extension services was formalized in 1914 and has grown and developed since.⁴ The result is a complex network of legal structures, professional and scientific policies and practices, interorganizational relationships, and financial flows. Therefore collaborative processes relating to information access include joint development of programs, research agendas, and data requirements among research and government partners. Formal and informal communication across users, providers, and repositories is supported by frequent professional and research conferences, staff flow across organizations, shared professional and educational backgrounds, and numerous advisory boards. These relationships are described in a bit more detail below in the discussion of the community as a provider type.

The primary result of this collaborative environment is a high level of interaction among users, producers, and custodians of agriculture information. These interactions include an annual user survey, cross agency and unit collaboration on creating new data sets, and shared funding of new access facilities and research. USDA staff from the Economics and Statistics System and other units spend substantial time with state and local offices and user organizations, traveling extensively to meetings, conferences, and other opportunities to stay in contact. As described by one interviewer, the collaboration is part of the day-to-day fabric of how these organizations and individuals work, not a separate activity engaged in for an occasional project or event.

The level of collaboration on information issues seen among agriculture organizations, based on such a long history, cannot be readily or fully duplicated in other domains. However, some of the specific aspects of the collaborative behavior can be employed elsewhere. These include regular surveys of users, attendance at professional and research conferences, instituting advisory boards, and other mechanisms for users and colleagues to participate in decision making.