SEMAINE D'ÉTUDE SUR LE ROLE DE L’ANALYSE ECONOMETRIQUE ETC, 
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scientifically, but they are data that science must take into 
account in fostering economic development. We still have 
anduly primitive tools and methods for ascertaining and 
describing even approximately the objectives of any country 
or any group within it. For example, we have no effective 
way of determining how a community acts when it tries to 
reconcile two such competing goals as a high rate of future 
economic growth and a high level of present consumption. 
Progress in this direction would not only be conducive to 
better planning for given goals, but would also contribute to 
a clearer formulation of these goals and to an improved level 
of political discussion of them. This in turn would lead to a 
more intelligent and satisfactory selection of such goals. 
Our discussions also made clear the need for a better under. 
standing of the capabilities as well as the limitations of various 
instruments of economic policies which governments can use 
in the pursuit of their short and long-run goals. Research on 
the nature of the instruments available has been neglected in 
favour of research on more narrowly economic problems, such 
as production functions and market behavior in the private 
sector. This neglect has led to the adoption of goals that could 
aot be attained by means of the available instruments and to 
overestimating the effectiveness of some instruments. In short, 
more research is needed into what governments can and cannot 
do in trying to foster economic development and stability. 
A side of economic development which we feel cannot be 
overemphasised is the race between increasing productivity and 
increasing population. Most of the research discussed at the 
Study Week was concerned with one aspect or another of 
productivity; yet measures for influencing the rate of popul- 
ation growth may contribute at times even more to human 
welfare than measures for influencing productivity. Much 
work, theoretical and empirical, sociological, physiological and 
economic, is needed on the population problem. Econometri- 
cians can contribute especially through theoretical studies on