ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the implementation functional specialties: Foundations asks the transformative/visionary question; Policies asks the policy question; Systematics asks the strategic question; and, Communications asks the practical question. The growth of the social sciences in the twentieth century brought with it not only analysis of social problems and proposed solutions but a strong focus on implementation, with new fields of study opening up such as policy analysis, social administration, urban studies, strategic studies, future studies and implementation studies. Social constructionism highlights the active role that social agents have in the construction of their world. Policy development is a strong theme within housing research. Governments, housing policy-makers and housing managers have demanded that housing research is policy relevant. Research-policy linkages and the implementation functional specialties papers by Jones and Seelig illustrate the movement from current research-policy linkages within AHURI to a proposal for better research-policy linkages within AHURI.
