Stephen A. Newman, a professor of law at New York Law School, has written a very interesting article titled “The Use and Abuse of Social Science in the Same-Sex Marriage Debate.” The full text is available at the Social Science Network Electronic Research Library.

The abstract describes the paper as follows: “There is no conclusive, scientific answer to the question of what children’s development and well-being will be if society permits same-sex marriages… A look back at past societal controversies, over eugenic sterilization and over interracial marriage, highlights the danger of relying on scientific theories to resolve social issues. Science in these past debates too often reinforced societal biases. The four guidelines suggested here for considering the welfare of children in the context of same-sex marriage treat social science studies as one input among others that, when fairly considered, give substantial support to allowing such marriages as a means to promote the welfare of children raised by same-sex couples.”

Within the paper Newman writes:

“The experience with eugenic sterilization and with interracial marriage bans illustrate the dangerous power that prejudice and science, working together, can exert on the law. In our times, opponents of same-sex marriage have called upon scientific experts to testify that same-sex marriage will harm children. Whenever social science reinforces popular prejudice, the social science must be subject to the most searching scrutiny. Because the position that same-sex marriage would damage the well being of children is aligned with the long tradition of anti-gay bias in this country, it deserves careful examination. I will also scrutinize the shortcomings of expert testimony offered in support of same-sex marriage, to fully explore the role of social science in this controversy.”

A popular assumption is that social science research is more readily or directly relevant to policy making than other types of science (e.g., physical, biological, ecological, etc.). Often I have seen physical, biological, etc. scientists calling for collaboration with a social scientist to make their work more policy relevant. Presumably this sort of assumption results from the fact that decisions (i.e., policies) are made by people and social scientists happen to study people. My experiences suggest that this popular assumption is simply incorrect for several reasons.

One reason is that many social scientists strive not to be policy relevant by emulating their peers in the other sciences. For example, the discipline of economics has tried to emulate Newtonian physics, and sociology has tried to emulate biology. In some respects the social sciences are just as reductionist and narrow as their peer disciplines outside of the social sciences. One irony here is that the model of science emulated by many in the social sciences is pretty dated, and increasingly under challenge within the disciplines being emulated.

If this interpretation is close to the mark it helps to explain why traditional social science is open to politicization in exactly the same way as is other forms of science. Consequently, to make research relevant, useful, and avoid its misuse it is simply not enough to “add in” social science expertise, something else is needed …

Newman’s article is worth reading in full and comparing to the pieces prepared in the ESP special issue I mentioned recently.