Agricultural Economics and the Changing Structure of Higher Education

Abstract

This paper is another of many that looks into a hazy future. The overall purpose is to identify some possible departmental strategies for the agricultural economics profession. These strategies follow from a discussion of the status of higher education, a review of findings from the Carnegie Commission reports, and from a study on alternative organizational structures—particularly institutes and centers.Strategies for the next decade relate to a serious set of issues particularly crucial to social science departments within universities. The issues seem related to clarifying the role of agricultural economics, to increased linkage of professional and political decision types, to greater balance of theory and empiricism on complex societal problems, and to increased concern for indirect effects of scientific and technological developments.