Public policy and social engineering are different

Public policy, the idea, implies practical solutions to advance humans. Social engineering , the idea, implies theories and good intentions to advance humans. While the two purposes may be close to many, the histories and pedigrees are vastly different.

Public policy is associated with poorer countries in that they have to do more with less. More with less includes time, as in saving lives from malaria with the means and knowledge at hand. Or electrifying a country, to include rural electrification, is public policy, to include making the electricity. Clean water, and cleaning waste water, is public policy because it benefits us all. And last, heating without all the coal pollution in the cities that blighted all our buildings and lungs was considered public policy. The theme is clear; public policy practices and decisions were intended to benefit us all, collectively.

Social engineering is a more recent occurrence in history, as in the last 100 years. Social engineering can be associated with social “scientists” and the many theories and intents to improve human kind, and the social scientists’ country in particular. We in the west seem to have more than our fair share of social scientists. Social engineering has brought us in the USA ideas like affirmative action, income taxes and redistribution of income for social engineering intents, equality of outcome in education, and environmentalism for the sake of all creatures with humans latter in the order of good intents.

If one believes that the pendulum swings in history, then the pendulum has swung too far towards the social engineering side. While the pendulum will enviably swing back the other way towards the public policy idea, a little pushing from us western types is in order. The eastern types in humanity may be too busy right now trying to do the basics like protecting their family. In fact, they are probably trying to advance their families' life style to something like we enjoy in the west, albeit their version.

Many may prefer to let the third world go down the tubes, which may be as simple as preserve the status quo. This idea is called benign neglect, and it is a course of action. Those in the State Department and other similar types may call this a “realist policy”. Call this a contradiction of terms, but realism is accepting that change is enviable, and cannot be legislated or managed. Postponed, maybe.

If one does not buy this argument, then thank you for reading. If one does buy this argument, then leadership by citizens and their politicians is the obvious solution. If only life were so easy. Promoting ideas is key, but so is voting. Numbers count.