Forsa institute
Encyclopedia
The forsa Institute for Social Research and Statistical Analysis , forsa for short, is one of the leading market research
and opinion polling
companies in Germany
. It was founded in 1984 by Manfred Güllner in Cologne
and is now headquartered in Berlin
with a branch in Dortmund
; it formerly also had an office in Riga
, Latvia
.
In addition to opinion research, forsa conducts surveys regarding community and other public services, basic industry, manufacturing, investments broadly construed, traffic and transport, financial services and print, television and other media.
Forsa has approximately 60 permanent employees, and hires further interviewers as part-time independent contractors from Monitel GmbH. In contrast GfK
, Germany's largest market research firm, has approximately 1,600 permanent employees in Germany alone.
of at least 1,000 persons per day between 4.30 and 9.00 pm., enabling them to reach most employed people. Those 14 and older are permitted to voluntarily answer questions, which primarily concern social research, political and election research, and media, marketing and online consumer research. The phone numbers are randomly selected and all data anonymised and evaluated only for statistical purposes. For statistical reasons, only the household member who last had a birthday is interviewed. The intention is to form a picture of the "typical German" which includes all ages and both sexes in equal proportions.
To maintain objectivity, the sponsors of a questionnaire are not named until interviews are completed. However, sponsoring firms and institutions and fields of interest can be gleaned from forsa's publications and those of industry groups such as the Berufsverband Deutscher Markt- und Sozialforscher and the European Society for Opinion and Marketing Research
. It is clear that opinion research alone no longer suffices to fund larger institutions.
of approximately 10,000 households throughout Germany, forsa.omninet, who are recruited offline and respond to surveys either online or via a television set-top box.
in connection with pre-election polls, most recently before the 2005 election in North Rhine-Westphalia
. Forsa was successful in obtaining an injunction against accusations from the CDU
on this issue, but their surveys did show in part a greater agreement with SPD positions than those of other polling firms. Forsa have themselves stated that they received 40,000 € in fees in connection with the national election in 2002 and in connection with the state election in 2005. In an interview on 6 September 2002, Hans Mathias Kepplinger, a professor of public relations at the University of Mainz, named three other firms as relatively likely to be free of party bias, but not forsa, although one of the three he named, the Institut für Demoskopie Allensbach, which has collaborated with the University of Mainz, cannot be said to be altogether free of ties to the CDU.
After the national elections in 2005, forsa's closeness to the SPD lessened appreciably and indeed reversed: in 2007 and still more in the first quarter of 2008, forsa reported poll results for the SPD an average of approximately 5% lower than those of other polling firms. Accusations have therefore been levelled at forsa of slanting results against the SPD and its "reformist course" after former Chancellor Gerhard Schröder
, a longtime friend of Manfred Güllner, stood down in favour of the CDU's Angela Merkel
.
One example was a study in summer 2008 on the basis of which forsa reported that 36% of SPD members had considered leaving the party. Then-party chief Kurt Beck
criticised Güllner severely and stated that he would not comment on forsa surveys.
. According to the statement of findings, the majority of students (59%) and of the population (67%) stated in November 2003 that they would accept tuition fees if they directly benefitted the educational institutions and could be financed through loans. The Centre for College Development announced these results in a press release in December 2003 and they were reported in the press. But later that month, a spokesperson for the Centre indirectly admitted that respondents were only given the option of deciding between three models of tuition fees, and not of rejecting them entirely.
In 2007 forsa was accused on the political website NachDenkSeiten of becoming involved through manipulation of a survey in a campaign by the organization Initiative Neue Soziale Marktwirtschaft (Initiative for a New Social Market Economy) for the introduction of private health insurance.
Forsa was the market research firm involved in the 2009 public relations scandal concerning Deutsche Bahn
. Surveys with leading question
s which produced results showing disapproval of the 2007 train drivers
' strike and approval of privatisation of the railway were secretly funded by Deutsche Bahn.
Market research
Market research is any organized effort to gather information about markets or customers. It is a very important component of business strategy...
and opinion polling
Opinion poll
An opinion poll, sometimes simply referred to as a poll is a survey of public opinion from a particular sample. Opinion polls are usually designed to represent the opinions of a population by conducting a series of questions and then extrapolating generalities in ratio or within confidence...
companies in Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
. It was founded in 1984 by Manfred Güllner in Cologne
Cologne
Cologne is Germany's fourth-largest city , and is the largest city both in the Germany Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and within the Rhine-Ruhr Metropolitan Area, one of the major European metropolitan areas with more than ten million inhabitants.Cologne is located on both sides of the...
and is now headquartered in Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
with a branch in Dortmund
Dortmund
Dortmund is a city in Germany. It is located in the Bundesland of North Rhine-Westphalia, in the Ruhr area. Its population of 585,045 makes it the 7th largest city in Germany and the 34th largest in the European Union....
; it formerly also had an office in Riga
Riga
Riga is the capital and largest city of Latvia. With 702,891 inhabitants Riga is the largest city of the Baltic states, one of the largest cities in Northern Europe and home to more than one third of Latvia's population. The city is an important seaport and a major industrial, commercial,...
, Latvia
Latvia
Latvia , officially the Republic of Latvia , is a country in the Baltic region of Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by Estonia , to the south by Lithuania , to the east by the Russian Federation , to the southeast by Belarus and shares maritime borders to the west with Sweden...
.
In addition to opinion research, forsa conducts surveys regarding community and other public services, basic industry, manufacturing, investments broadly construed, traffic and transport, financial services and print, television and other media.
Forsa has approximately 60 permanent employees, and hires further interviewers as part-time independent contractors from Monitel GmbH. In contrast GfK
GfK
The GfK Group, established in 1934 as Gesellschaft für Konsumforschung is Germany's largest market research institute, and the fourth largest market research organisation in the world, after Nielsen Company, Kantar Group, and IMS Health...
, Germany's largest market research firm, has approximately 1,600 permanent employees in Germany alone.
Telephone polling
Forsa currently uses computer-assisted telephone interviewing, telephoning a representative sampleStatistical survey
Survey methodology is the field that studies surveys, that is, the sample of individuals from a population with a view towards making statistical inferences about the population using the sample. Polls about public opinion, such as political beliefs, are reported in the news media in democracies....
of at least 1,000 persons per day between 4.30 and 9.00 pm., enabling them to reach most employed people. Those 14 and older are permitted to voluntarily answer questions, which primarily concern social research, political and election research, and media, marketing and online consumer research. The phone numbers are randomly selected and all data anonymised and evaluated only for statistical purposes. For statistical reasons, only the household member who last had a birthday is interviewed. The intention is to form a picture of the "typical German" which includes all ages and both sexes in equal proportions.
To maintain objectivity, the sponsors of a questionnaire are not named until interviews are completed. However, sponsoring firms and institutions and fields of interest can be gleaned from forsa's publications and those of industry groups such as the Berufsverband Deutscher Markt- und Sozialforscher and the European Society for Opinion and Marketing Research
European Society for Opinion and Marketing Research
The European Society for Opinion and Market Research is a world association for market, social and opinion researchers.Founded in 1948, ESOMAR began as a regional association within Europe...
. It is clear that opinion research alone no longer suffices to fund larger institutions.
Further survey methods
Forsa also uses other interviewing and surveying methods, in particular computer-assisted personal interviewing for business to business surveys.Online surveys
For online research, forsa uses its own intranetIntranet
An intranet is a computer network that uses Internet Protocol technology to securely share any part of an organization's information or network operating system within that organization. The term is used in contrast to internet, a network between organizations, and instead refers to a network...
of approximately 10,000 households throughout Germany, forsa.omninet, who are recruited offline and respond to surveys either online or via a television set-top box.
Accusations of political bias
Both forsa and its head, Manfred Güllner, have been accused of bias towards the SPDSocial Democratic Party of Germany
The Social Democratic Party of Germany is a social-democratic political party in Germany...
in connection with pre-election polls, most recently before the 2005 election in North Rhine-Westphalia
North Rhine-Westphalia
North Rhine-Westphalia is the most populous state of Germany, with four of the country's ten largest cities. The state was formed in 1946 as a merger of the northern Rhineland and Westphalia, both formerly part of Prussia. Its capital is Düsseldorf. The state is currently run by a coalition of the...
. Forsa was successful in obtaining an injunction against accusations from the CDU
Christian Democratic Union (Germany)
The Christian Democratic Union of Germany is a Christian democratic and conservative political party in Germany. It is regarded as on the centre-right of the German political spectrum...
on this issue, but their surveys did show in part a greater agreement with SPD positions than those of other polling firms. Forsa have themselves stated that they received 40,000 € in fees in connection with the national election in 2002 and in connection with the state election in 2005. In an interview on 6 September 2002, Hans Mathias Kepplinger, a professor of public relations at the University of Mainz, named three other firms as relatively likely to be free of party bias, but not forsa, although one of the three he named, the Institut für Demoskopie Allensbach, which has collaborated with the University of Mainz, cannot be said to be altogether free of ties to the CDU.
After the national elections in 2005, forsa's closeness to the SPD lessened appreciably and indeed reversed: in 2007 and still more in the first quarter of 2008, forsa reported poll results for the SPD an average of approximately 5% lower than those of other polling firms. Accusations have therefore been levelled at forsa of slanting results against the SPD and its "reformist course" after former Chancellor Gerhard Schröder
Gerhard Schröder
Gerhard Fritz Kurt Schröder is a German politician, and was Chancellor of Germany from 1998 to 2005. A member of the Social Democratic Party of Germany , he led a coalition government of the SPD and the Greens. Before becoming a full-time politician, he was a lawyer, and before becoming Chancellor...
, a longtime friend of Manfred Güllner, stood down in favour of the CDU's Angela Merkel
Angela Merkel
Angela Dorothea Merkel is the current Chancellor of Germany . Merkel, elected to the Bundestag from Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, has been the chairwoman of the Christian Democratic Union since 2000, and chairwoman of the CDU-CSU parliamentary coalition from 2002 to 2005.From 2005 to 2009 she led a...
.
One example was a study in summer 2008 on the basis of which forsa reported that 36% of SPD members had considered leaving the party. Then-party chief Kurt Beck
Kurt Beck
Kurt Beck is a German politician , serving as the Minister-President of Rhineland-Palatinate since 1994 and as President of the Bundesrat in 2000/01. On May 14, 2006, he succeeded Matthias Platzeck as Chairman of the German Social Democratic Party...
criticised Güllner severely and stated that he would not comment on forsa surveys.
Accusations of data manipulation
In 2003 forsa was accused of data manipulation in a poll on tuition fees for higher education commissioned by the Centre for College Development (Centrum für Hochschulentwicklung) co-founded by the Bertelsmann FoundationBertelsmann Foundation
The Bertelsmann Foundation is the largest private operating non-profit foundation in Germany, created in 1977 by Reinhard Mohn. The Bertelsmann Foundation holds 77.4 percent of Bertelsmann AG....
. According to the statement of findings, the majority of students (59%) and of the population (67%) stated in November 2003 that they would accept tuition fees if they directly benefitted the educational institutions and could be financed through loans. The Centre for College Development announced these results in a press release in December 2003 and they were reported in the press. But later that month, a spokesperson for the Centre indirectly admitted that respondents were only given the option of deciding between three models of tuition fees, and not of rejecting them entirely.
In 2007 forsa was accused on the political website NachDenkSeiten of becoming involved through manipulation of a survey in a campaign by the organization Initiative Neue Soziale Marktwirtschaft (Initiative for a New Social Market Economy) for the introduction of private health insurance.
Forsa was the market research firm involved in the 2009 public relations scandal concerning Deutsche Bahn
Deutsche Bahn
Deutsche Bahn AG is the German national railway company, a private joint stock company . Headquartered in Berlin, it came into existence in 1994 as the successor to the former state railways of Germany, the Deutsche Bundesbahn of West Germany and the Deutsche Reichsbahn of East Germany...
. Surveys with leading question
Leading question
In common law systems that rely on testimony by witnesses, a leading question or suggestive interrogation is a question that suggests the answer or contains the information the examiner is looking for. For example, this question is leading:...
s which produced results showing disapproval of the 2007 train drivers
Gewerkschaft Deutscher Lokomotivführer
The Gewerkschaft Deutscher Lokomotivführer is a German trade union present in train companies. It has a membership of 34,000 , concentrated in the former East Germany.-2007 strike:...
' strike and approval of privatisation of the railway were secretly funded by Deutsche Bahn.
External links
- about forsa, official English-language homepage