social engineering

Max Sawicky sawicky at bellatlantic.net
Sat Sep 9 23:22:07 PDT 2000


Whatever the scholarly background, no politician today would be caught dead endorsing anything under the rubric of "social engineering." Not for nothing did G. Bush Senior ridicule Dukakis for reading books about "Swedish social planning."

Of course, all this new markets stuff from Clinton is precisely an effort at social engineering. The same applies for the Repugs assorted forays against immorality and cultural decay.

mbs

Hi kelley -

you wrote:


>for me, social engineering (SE) is a concept that is used to characterize
>comte and saint simon. but more than that, people characterize
>enlightenment liberal social theories that emerged during the industrial
>and political revolutions as theories that favored, in one form or another,
>social engineering.
>
<snip-snip>

so it's not an explizit concept in Comte or Saint-Simon but more characterization by their interpreters/critics? i mean i'm wondering if its a source (historical) or research concept. (what i've come across lately is Durkheim's 1895 analogy of the sociologist to the doctor, to a "médicin [qui] prévient l¹éclosion des maladies par une bonne hygiène et, quand elles sont déclarées, il cherche à les guérir") i don't have Comte at hand however. what i do have and took a quick look-thru is the doctrine du S-S, and did not see the term there, at least in any recognisable form in the german translation. their keyword's of course "industriel"; but saint-simonistes were more into *civil* engineering than social engineering, nay? maybe the deconstruction of industrial catechism for 'railroad popes'* in spe isn't the right place to look anyway.

well, i guess my understanding's closer to yours, but in more terms of institutions and policies than theory. as to the polemical use of SE by right libertarian americans, i was totally unaware of that.

Anita

*Heine on the brothers Pereire



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