ABSTRACT
The changing nature of activities being conducted within both public and private sectors, together with the widening scope of the problems these sectors deal with, precipitate situations that demand the knowledge and experience that can be offered through social science disciplines. These disciplines, however, have developed in such a manner that they provide no 'visible technology'. Application of social science knowledge is much discussed but little practised, while the social engineer or 'applied social scientist' remains an elusive being. Application is a concept that is rarely well received by established university-based social scientists; yet demands for more formal institutional structures through which social science application can be both taught and practised have been a feature of several recent national moves in the the social science policy area.
