When Institutions Fail: Can Viable Social Policies then be Formulated?1 This paper examines evidence that egalitarian social scientists, by denying the interaction of biological and environmental factors, have generated and continue to generate a series of counterproductive educational reforms. Focus is placed on forced busing, as shaped by policymakers who emphasized environmental and ignored biophysical factors and naively concluded that massive transportation of students away from their neighborhood schools would produce meaningful educational benefits. But busing is no longer an issue; the egg is broken, the damage done. Key Words: School busing, school grades, education, intelligence, racial integration, egalitarian ideologies Introduction Given widespread admission that busing has proven counterproductive, it might be assumed that the lesson has been learned, will not be repeated, and authentically productive schooling policies will now be forged. Regrettably this is not the case: key individuals working within institutions responsible for past busing miscalculations -- courts, media, government agencies, churches, universities, and professional organizations -- haven't remorsely paused to appraise the harm busing has imposed on students, families, the schooling enterprise and indeed society in general. Instead, they plan still more ambitious and equally detrimental schooling innovations based on assumptions which ignore the impact of biology and parental responsibilities in the development of human abilities. The power and ideology of egalitarians, and the institutions they control, must be reassessed and diluted if authentically beneficial interventions for significant sensitive social and educational issues and programs are to be implemented. Within the limits of a single paper and for the purpose of illustrating the counterproductivity of institutional breakdowns on quality education, I first present an overview of the impact of forced busing, and how the egalitarian rationale of forced busing conflicts with established knowledge concerning dynamics of human development. I then review how institutional forces uncritically, and often with the best of intentions, embraced busing as a quick fix for dealing with persisting, and often ethnic related, educational inequities.2 This is followed by a discussion of current and pending schooling and societal reforms, based on the same ideological prejudices which created busing, which if implemented will continue to inflict harm on students, families, and communities while further eroding public confidence in our basic institutions. Next, I review some of my personal experiences, which illustrate certain reasons why past and current researchers are discouraged from objectively assessing sensitive educational and social issues. Finally I examine evidence that - unless an aroused public acts - societal policies will continue to be shaped by ideologies which disregard science, civility, and the rules upon which a viable and truly democratic society survives.(1) A Failed Experiment Busing represents a major juncture in American life and reveals the cost to society when basic institutions implement policies which naively follow a moralistic or politically expedient course and disregard scientific knowledge. In retrospect it is lucidly clear that busing was launched over 40 years ago with the fervor of a crusade; social justice and educational quality were presumably at stake as busloads of children were transported - often over objections of parents and especially African-American parents.(2) But now the rationale of busing lies in shambles; busing is acknowledged as an incredibly simplistic response to complex schooling issues, whose institutional support reveals that historic societal bulwarks suffer such profound inability to deal with sensitive social and racial issues as to render them incapable of responsibly meeting their historic obligations. …