Social sciences have been taking flak recently. Not just in Estonia, but also elsewhere in the world. In short, social scientists are accused of their research lacking practical value and for sporting slanted and obviously leftist views.

Indeed, many fail to understand why such disciplines are needed in the first place if instead of offering relevant and practical advice they mostly engage in woke-activism while juggling such incomprehensible terms as postcolonialism, intersectionality, genderdness, discourses etc.

The criticism is not for nothing and social scientists would do well to take a look in the mirror from time to time. Still, I would like to overturn the idea that social scientists are useless and only look at the world through narrow ideological blinders.

It bears underscoring that social sciences were born and have flourished only in democratic societies. In authoritarian states, they are always banished to the fringes of science or are outright banned. This means that social sciences must offer democracy something other branches cannot. What could that be?

First, social sciences are far from being useless as they can offer political decision-makers a lot of valuable and knowledge-based information in many different areas. Let us not forget that international relations scholars are also social scientists. What would be the level of expertise regarding the challenges of the Ukraine war in our ministries and the diplomatic corps if Estonia and the region lacked universities teaching international relations and security?

These are far from being the only examples. Social sciences expert knowledge has been used when planning our administrative reform, shaping our integration policy, putting together the foundations of our pension policy, reorganizing the schools network, mapping labor market trends.

By suggesting that social sciences are useless, one should also consider the alternative: important decisions in different fields would be made without broader expert know-how and data, based instead on the gut feeling and arbitrary discretion of politicians and officials. Would it really be a better solution?

Slow decision-making is a peculiarity of democracy, while the decisions tend to be well-weighed and based on diverse information. Therefore, it is not by chance that demand for social sciences is so high in democratic societies.

Secondly, one thing social sciences students take with them from university is the capacity for critical thought and the realization that societies are multifaceted and the world open to myriad different interpretations.

Social sciences, more than any other branch, recognize that there may be many different explanations for the same phenomena. For example, there are dozens of different explanations and theories for why some countries have successful democracies and economies while others do not. One must be able to compare and analyze them all to filter out those that really rely on substantial argumentation.

Social sciences teach us to see that there may be very different views and interpretations of what is happening in society, while all of them need to be weighed critically and based on evidence and facts. If the realization that society is pluralistic and that navigating its diversity requires critical thinking is not a core aspect of democracy, I don't know what is.

Thirdly, because a considerable part of social sciences compare countries, peoples and communities, they help overcome egocentrism, avoid encapsulation and overestimation of oneself into thinking my country or people is the center of the world, completely unique and better than others. Like it or not, we inhabit a globalizing world where admiring one's own navel and ignoring everyone else has seldom led to success.

So, it is not by chance that the social sciences seem to flourish in the conditions of democracy. The field, in its own particular way, supports democratic core values and what it means to be a citizen.

If carefully considered and knowledge-based decisions and citizens who can think critically, tolerate diversity in society and are capable of seeing beyond their own navel are not values for a democracy in the 21st century, I don't know what is. Therefore, it is also little wonder that social scientists tend to primarily get in the way of those who promote diametrically opposite values and goals.

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