Thinking with History in Policy

Abstract

In recent years, the relationship between history and policy has gained space both in public and academic debate. In public debate this was due mainly to the further development of public history and its sub-fields. The relationship between history and policy can be included within applied history, which argues that the knowledge of the past can help to form an aware citizenship, to train a well-informed decision-maker and to develop far-sighted policies. Therefore, in order to understand the interplay between policy and history it is necessary to consider the broadest framework of public history and its development before analysing the development of applied history and policy history. However, by the late 1970s, particularly in the United States, the relationship between history and policy was already being analysed through academic lenses thanks to the cooperation of a group of academic historians, political scientists and policy scholars. Thus, policy history emerged as an interdisciplinary academic field and not only as a practical exercise. The article aims to take into account both the practical/advisory element of the relationship between history and policy and its academic development by professional historians as policy history.