Social planning: past, present, and future

This article discusses the history of the idea of social planning, and of the pioneering Masters Programme in Social Planning established at the University of Wales Swansea in 1973. Swanseaʹs initiative in social planning led to the creation of the Universityʹs Centre for Development Studies (CDS), and it broadened development studies as an academic and policy field. Social planning is a controversial term because it has sometimes been associated with social engineering and totalitarianism. Nevertheless, it has a very important intellectual and policy agenda, and if the word ʹplanningʹ proves a liability it can be replaced by ʹpolicyʹ or ʹstrategyʹ. The major questions reviewed at CDS-Swansea in the 1970s are still pertinent, and new dimensions have been added through growing concerns for nation-building, sustainability, democracy, gender equity and human rights.