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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 March 2014
SARTORI'S COMMENT THAT UNDERCOMPREHENSION APPLIES to the engineering of history provides a starting point for these reflections since those words suggest three familiar ideas — purpose, thought and action — as do also other expressions he uses: ‘our cognitive control of ourselves’, ‘the shaping of societies and polities’, and a ‘policy enactment which amounted to little else than allowing markets to blossom’. Purpose, thought and action can be seen as aspects of management, at least in the context of this discussion and provided it is clear that decisions not to act can often be a form of management; so can we justify equating undercomprehension with unmanageability.
Purposes with varying degrees of compatibility are pursued and both cooperation and conflict characterize the pursuit; instruments are required for planning, for conflict resolution and for damage limitation.
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