Social scientists have proposed several different models for the relationship between social science theory, empirical social research and the actual making of public social policy. This book, first published in 1980, seeks to provide a critical analysis of the impact of research on policy through the detailed examination of the part which research played in the work of Royal Commissions of Inquiry, the bodies set up by government to consider, gather evidence on, report and make recommendations about specific policy areas. This titles varied and stimulating chapters will serve to shed considerable light, not all of it positive, upon the potential contribution of the social sciences to the practice of government. This book will be of interest to students of the social sciences, particularly sociology and politics.

Social scientists have proposed several different models for the relationship between social science theory, empirical social research and the actual making of public social policy. This book, first published in 1980, seeks to provide a critical analysis of the impact of research on policy through the detailed examination of the part which research played in the work of Royal Commissions of Inquiry, the bodies set up by government to consider, gather evidence on, report and make recommendations about specific policy areas. This titles varied and stimulating chapters will serve to shed considerable light, not all of it positive, upon the potential contribution of the social sciences to the practice of government. This book will be of interest to students of the social sciences, particularly sociology and politics.

The growth and health of the social sciences owe a good deal to the generally held belief that they are socially useful, but is this really so? Do they deliver the goods they promise? In The Uses of Social Research, first published in 1982, Martin Bulmer answers these and other questions concerning the uses of empirical social science in the policy-making process, and provides an extended analysis of the main issues. This title provides a valuable introduction to the patterns of influence exercised by the social sciences on government. It shows how the results of social research feed into the political system and what models of the relationship between research and policy are most convincing. This book will be of interest to students of the social sciences.

In the mid-nineteenth century, American and British governments marched with great fanfare into the marketplace of knowledge and publishing. British royal commissions of inquiry, inspectorates, and parliamentary committees conducted famous social inquiries into child labor, poverty, housing, and factories. The American federal government studied Indian tribes, explored the West, and investigated the condition of the South during and after the Civil War. Performing, printing, and then circulating these studies, government established an economy of exchange with its diverse constituencies. In this medium, which Frankel terms "print statism," not only tangible objects such as reports and books but knowledge itself changed hands. As participants, citizens assumed the standing of informants and readers. Even as policy investigations and official reportage became a distinctive feature of the modern governing process, buttressing the claim of the state to represent its populace, government discovered an unintended consequence: it could exercise only limited control over the process of inquiry, the behavior of its emissaries as investigators or authors, and the fate of official reports once issued and widely circulated. This study contributes to current debates over knowledge, print culture, and the growth of the state as well as the nature and history of the "public sphere." It interweaves innovative, theoretical discussions into meticulous, historical analysis.