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The social sciences are increasingly ill-equipped to design system-level reforms

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 August 2023

Michelle Jackson Open the ORCID record for Michelle Jackson [Opens in a new window]
Michelle Jackson*
Affiliation:
Department of Sociology, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA mvjsoc@stanford.edu; www.mivich.com
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Abstract

Our social policy landscape is characterized by incrementalism, while public calls for more radical reform get louder. But the social sciences cannot be relied upon to generate a steady stream of radical, system-level policies. Long-standing trends in social science – in particular, increasing specialization, an increasing emphasis on causal inference, and the growing replication crisis – are barriers to system-level policy development.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 46 , 2023 , e162
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Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2023. Published by Cambridge University Press

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