World Social Science Report: Knowledge Divides

I welcome the publication of the 2010 World Social Science Report, the first thorough overview of this important field in more than a decade. Edited by and co-published with the International Social Science Council (ISSC), it is the product of the active engagement of hundreds of professional social scientists who have contributed their expertise to make this publication a reference. The Report reaffirms UNESCO’s commitment to the social sciences, and our desire to set a new global agenda to promote them as an invaluable tool for the advancement of the internationally agreed development goals. UNESCO, with its emphasis on the management of social transformation, is concerned that the social sciences should be put to use to improve human well-being and to respond to global challenges. As long ago as 1974, UNESCO’s General Conference adopted a Recommendation on the Status of Scientific Researchers which emphasized ’the need to apply science and technology in a great variety of specific fields of wider than national concern: namely such vast and complex problems as the preservation of international peace and the elimination of want’.