ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the history of social indicators, at both the national and community levels, as an ongoing interplay between descriptive and diagnostic indicators. These two types of indicators are directly in conflict with each other because some type of description has often been necessary to recognize problems, at which point diagnosis is required to solve them. The use of diagnostic indicators could be of great value to communities. Most conservative economists have been unsympathetic to any political movement that favors the compilation of social indicators. The Russell Sage Foundation supported the precursor to community indicators work because it believed the surveys would yield results. The excitement generated by the social indicators movement also had effects on international agencies. The reliance on descriptive methods is especially true of social indicators. Recognition of the contribution offered by positivism could deepen, transform and sustain the social indicators movement.
