ABSTRACT
Developing and implementing a system of social indicators that can instrumentally shape public policies has emerged as a critical challenge in recent years. Driving this challenge are the public sector devolution and reinvention movements, two of the more powerful themes now shaping U.S. social policy. Devolution constitutes a shift in program authority from more inclusive levels of government to levels closer to the problems intended to be addressed (e.g., from the national government to local communities). Similarly, the reinvention movement shifts public sector management from a focus on process and inputs (what programs and policies do or invest) to a focus on outcomes (what policies and programs accomplish).
