
Contents
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1 Nature of Truth and Knowledge 1 Nature of Truth and Knowledge
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2 Relationship Between Academic and Policy Knowledge 2 Relationship Between Academic and Policy Knowledge
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3 Political Constraints of Academic and Policy Knowledge 3 Political Constraints of Academic and Policy Knowledge
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4 Conclusion 4 Conclusion
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References References
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36 Scholarship and Policy‐Making: Who Speaks Truth to Whom?
Get accessHenry R. Nau is a professor of Political Science and International Affairs at George Washington University. His latest book is Conservative Internationalism: Armed Diplomacy under Jefferson, Polk, Truman, and Reagan. From January 1981 to July 1983, he served on President Reagan’s National Security Council as senior staff member responsible for international economic affairs. Among other duties he was the White House sherpa for the Annual G-7 Economic Summits at Ottawa (1981), Versailles (1982), and Williamsburg (1983) and a special summit with developing countries at Cancun, Mexico (1982). He also served, in 1975–1977, as Special Assistant to the Under Secretary for Economic Affairs in the Department of State. In 2016, the Japanese Government awarded him The Order of the Rising Sun, Gold Rays with Neck Ribbon acknowledging his efforts as director from 1989 to 2016 of the U.S. -Japan-South Korea Legislative Exchange Program. He holds a BS degree in Economics, Politics and Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and MA and PhD degrees from the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies.
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Published:02 September 2009
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Abstract
The split between scholarship and statesmanship has grown wider since the Second World War. Today it is rare, if not inconceivable, that leading academics incubate in government service, as many post-war scholars did, or that top government officials lead the academy, as Woodrow Wilson did as president of Princeton University. The divorce between scholarship and policy-making has gone too far. This article makes three arguments that the two professions in fact depend upon one another. First, neither profession can make a superior claim to social knowledge. Social knowledge is not primarily objective such that scholars speak truth to power, nor is it primarily intersubjective such that consensus or policy success dictates truth. Rather social knowledge is primarily evolutionary. It is a product of the interaction between the study of policy and the making of policy, which leads over time to social change in directions that scholars discern and dispute. Secondly, while scholars and policy-makers pursue different types of knowledge, both types are necessary to achieve progress, especially when social knowledge is understood as evolutionary. Thirdly, both scholars and policy-makers make political commitments in pursuing their respective tasks.
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