Social Science is involved in solving the world’s most pressing problems, and can have a profound impact on every aspect of our shared lives. It holds the promise of improving human well-being. For example, a question a social scientist might seek to pose is: what are the attitudes and behaviours of people towards those suffering from infectious diseases, violent crime, and gender-based violence?

Social science students at St Augustine College are prepared with knowledge, skills and values in various disciplines and discourses that can transform society. Fields of study include, inter alia, economics, intercultural communication, law, politics, psychology, sociology, peace studies and education. Study in these fields foster students’ critical thinking & critical self-reflexivity, insight, ethical behaviour, as well as analytical and communication skills. They contribute to realizing St Augustine College’s central values of: respect for human dignity; solidarity; the common good; justice; and the preferential option for the disadvantaged and marginalized.
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The task of the social sciences is to “ help men and women save their souls and, in so doing, save their society: from what? From the hell of meaninglessness, of obsession, of complex artifice, of systematic lying, of criminal evasions and neglect, and of self-destructive futilities” (Thomas Merton).

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