Talk:Social engineering (political science)

Blatant Bias

This articles start, if not its entirety, is clearly biased toward the governments position. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.198.128.158 (talk) 09:07, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Agreed, saying that the War on Drugs has had "far-reaching" success is complete bullshit. 132.198.22.255 (talk) 19:58, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

Socially Engineering the Free

It is important to socially engineer citizens of democracies. Even low-level social engineers have the wisdom to carry this out if they follow the guidelines provided. Were we to try to create societies of noble and free individuals by non-coercive means such as education, example and authentic discussion it wouldn't work anyway, so none of this is cynical. (The question whether or not it is Orwellian is not to be addressed--cf. "doublethink.")

The article as it stands plunges into totalism right from the second paragraph, starting with the petifogging tactic of regarding law and education as inherently social engineering functions when in truth (as the article itself goes on to point out) this depends upon intent.

Article is negative

Consideration of "social engineering" need not be restricted to its negative implications. For instance, the discipline of practical interventions in intergroup conflicts propose manipulating group dynamics, cognitive processes, situational variables, economic rewards, and other macro level factors to moderate the negative outcomes of intergroup behavior (e.g., stereotyping, prejudice). Indeed, one could argue that some social engineering attempts, such as affirmative action programs in the US, actually produce benefits for the society at large.

In a democratic society, social engineering is a tool of governance, and it can be a particularly powerful one. The use of the tool to achieve specific ends is typically driven by policy, and its impacts interpreted according to values. As G.W. Allport noted in his 1954 volume The Nature of Prejudice:

Democracy ...places a heavy burden upon the personality, sometimes too great to bear. The maturely democratic person must possess subtle virtues and capacities: an ability to think rationally about causes and effects, an ability to form properly differentiated categories in respect to ethnic groups and their traits, a willingness to award freedom to others, and a capacity to employ it constructively for oneself. All these qualities are difficult to achieve and maintain. It is easier to succumb to oversimplification and dogmatism, to repudiate the ambiguities inherent in a democratic society, to demand definiteness, to "escape from freedom" (pp.. 477-478).

Twenty-first century democracies leave little time for the average citizen to maintain a "maturely democratic personality."

Just as with any other tool, persons applying social engineering in governance are ultimately responsible for the ramifications of them. The complex and chaotic nature of society complicates forecasting these ramifications beyond the overt and immediate. A practicioner of the science of social engineering ultimately relies on his or her own values, and of those groups they represent, to direct the application of their craft to serve what he or she considers desirable social policy.

Therefore, even though social engineering can be used to manipulate individuals and groups for selfish gain (e.g., demagoguery), it can also be used to encourage behaviors for a greater good (e.g., conservation and pollution control). Our conviction must be that if we can control the forces of society, we must also practice mature democracy. User:DrCotton (sig added by Sam Spade 16:01, 5 May 2005 (UTC))

I agree that the article is less than neutral in its presentation of the subject. it also focuses overmuch on a large quote. Sam Spade 16:01, 5 May 2005 (UTC)

I also agree that the article is much much too negative and one-sided. Added NPOV tag. The general quality and detail of the article also needs significant work Bwithh 14:11, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

I agree too, more that the article is of poor standard, as I believe that countering civil liberties will inherently give a bias regardless of the views of the author. --62.190.198.154 10:18, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Cleanup

I've cleaned up the page formatting slightly and changed the cleanup for an expand tag. It doesn't need a cleanup as so much as a lot more info. - FrancisTyers 12:24, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

I have attempted to clean up, structure and neutralize the content on this page without adding a lot of information. I think from this point it will be easier to streamline, update and expand the information. - User:hartfordshawn 2:09, 04 January 2006

I have attempted to make the page more politically and ideologically neutral by clearly naming both sides in the political debate over who is accused of attempting which social engineering programs. - User: sstaley 12:42, 19 October 2010 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.12.14.211 (talk)

Social engineering of Jews in Imperial Russia

Beyond the Pale: The Jewish Encounter with Late Imperial Russia (2001) by Benjamin Nathans quotes Terence Emmons (himself cited in Russia's Great Reforms, 1855-1881 (1994), p. vii), who describes Tsar Alexander II's domestic policies as "the greatest single piece of state-directed social engineering in modern European history before the twentieth century" (p 69).

The term social engineering is used here with particular reference to Alex. II's use of (1) policies that promoted the political and geographic integration of Jews, their commercial markets and social lives into the Russian mainstream, and (2) the selective use of these policies toward Jews deemed good for the Empire, i.e., university graduates, successful merchants, highly proficient artisans or retired Russian soldiers, so as encourage scholarship, commerce, and military service.

Social engineering? Please comment.

Omphaloscope » talk 22:06, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

Deficiencies

First it fails to capture the real essence of the term and it's commonest connotation which is literally the engineering of society, i.e. as a particular social structure. Second, it fails to capture the fact the term was coined as a right wing reaction specifically to the directives of the U.S. Judiciary to enforce racial integration. Finally, and a result of the first, it ignores specific real conscious attempts at social engineering. like those of Skinner and others. For the en:wp to indicate that the common connotation of this term is social engineering (computer security) is a glaring fault. Lycurgus 02:38, 16 November 2007 (UTC)C)

Comment placed on dab page - for consideration to be included in article

The following was left on the disambiguation page for Social engineering, and may prove useful in relation to this article:

"We've come to understand that almost any high impact media event is going to be used as a social engineering tool for malware," said Dave Marcus, security research and communications manager at McAfee. "It's such a horrible event, but at the end of the day, it's a very good social engineering tactic."Malware Sites Exploit Bhutto Assassination

--Risker (talk) 06:12, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

I placed this quote because the Social engineering page requested citation and confused me, that the actual page is Wikipedia:Disambiguation. I will look at how to incorporate the quotation ny McAfee engineer into the actual article. Thank you, Igor Berger (talk) 07:19, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

Engineering: the systematic use of science by a group of people to mold physical reality to the greater benefit of a third party. Common definitions insists on the use of physical sciences for the benefit of a group of people, see for example http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/engineering http://www.thefreedictionary.com/engineering

http://www.wpi.edu/Academics/Depts/CHE/About/definition.html Disciplinary Definition Chemical Engineering is the profession in which knowledge of mathematics, physics, chemistry and biology, gained by study, experience, and practice, is applied with judgment to develop economic and safe ways of using materials to benefit mankind. Occupational Definition Chemical Engineering is a broad discipline dealing with processes (industrial and natural) involving the transformation (chemical, biological, or physical) of matter or energy into forms useful for mankind, economically and without compromising environment, safety, or finite

An action to be considered social engineering must be based on scientific knowledge; it must have a specific measurable goal and be a group action. The rules of law evolved over millenia in an ad-hoc manner, it is questionable whether it constitutes engineering although engineering may be applicable. To give a comparison, Cairo and London are partial products of urbanism but not fully.

Social engineering may be seen as evil when it crosses the line between molding on one hand relationships between members of a society, whether flesh-ware or paper-ware, and on the other hand, molding those members directly and systematically, that is whether it the relationships between people are regarded as a material or the people themselves.

Palmipede (talk) 23:13, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

Image copyright problem with File:1984first.jpg

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Major Revamp Needed

This article is far from reaching its potential, I believe it needs much work. A lot of the information here seems to be misunderstood as social engineering when it is in fact describing political engineering. I've made some changes but don't want to make too many until receiving feedback and differing points of view. Thanks everyone!

--FusionHalo 05:36, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Since this article descibres social engineering in political science, that is the right notion. What you are looking for is a different kind of social engineering (related to sociology), and is not in scope of this article. Therefore this article needs to be reversed to its previous state.

82.131.132.9 (talk) 22:32, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

Removing possible vandalism

I will remove the secction "The O'Brien and Gandon theory" because:

A) It was included -without sources o references, by an IP, according to whom: "This theory was unveiled at Dublin Institute of Technology on the 10th of March 2010."

There is no data regarding any such "unveiling" in the new's archive of said institute - see Newsroom Archive 2010

The only reference in google about "the theory" is to be found in here or mirrors.

There are no reference en Google scholar about the alleged authors.

No other reference can be found in any academic literature.

All that makes me believe it was vandalism. If you know better, restore and add references. Cheers Lnegro (talk) 23:25, 22 August 2010 (UTC)