Some of the changes we observe between censuses will therefore be down to changes in boundaries and others to actual changes in society. Managing this process of balancing continuity versus change is fundamental to many census design decisions.
(but most are very good!)
No matter how much thought, effort and usa rcs data testing has gone into question design and delivery, issues can still arise – it’s inevitable with the size of the exercise and the many functions for which it is used.
One of the fascinating dilemmas about the UK censuses is that most users want to use the data to understand society objectively, while society itself has a huge impact on shaping the data collection process and the questions.
Some issues with previous censuses have included particular kinds of under-enumeration or challenges related to public policy debate at the time, impacting on the ways people respond and answer questions.
The unpopularity of the ‘poll tax’ affected census response levels in 1991, while an outbreak of foot and mouth disease greatly increased the complexity of enumeration in 2001.