Project Camelot

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Project Camelot was a social science research project of the United States Defense Department in 1964. The goal of the project was to assess the causes of war and to identify the actions a government could take to preclude such wars. The proposal caused much controversy among the social scientists, many of whom argued that such a study would end up using social scientific research to strengthen the established government and to put down revolutionary movements in Latin America and other then-volatile places. The project was canceled as the Defense Department came under increasing criticism for attempting to subvert social research.

Contents 1 Quote 2 See also 3 External links 4 References 5 Further reading

[edit] Quote

Project CAMELOT is a study whose objective is to determine the feasibility of developing a general social systems model which would make it possible to predict and influence politically significant aspects of social change in the developing nations of the world. Somewhat more specifically, its objectives are:

First, to devise procedures for assessing the potential for internal war within national societies;

Second, to identify with increased degrees of confidence those actions which a government might take to relieve conditions which are assessed as giving rise to a potential for internal war; and

Finally, to assess the feasibility of prescribing the characteristics of a system for obtaining and using the essential information needed for doing the above two things. [1]

[edit] See also

• State Failure Task Force

[edit] External links

• Anthropology and Counterinsurgency: The Strange Story of their Curious Relationship
• Excerpts of various relaated articles

[edit] References

• Earl Babbie, The Practice of Social Research, 10th edition, Wadsworth, Thomson Learning Inc. ISBN 0534620299

[edit] Further reading

• Irving Louis Horowitz, ed., The Rise and Fall of Project Camelot: Studies in the Relationship Between Social Science and Practical Politics, Cambridge MA: The M.I.T. Press, 1967 JSTOR
• A. L. Madian, A. N. Oppenheim, "Knowledge for What? The Camelot Legacy: The Dangers of Sponsored Research in the Social Sciences", British Journal of Sociology, Vol. 20, No. 3 (Sep., 1969), pp. 326-336. JSTOR