At the dawn of the third millennium. Dimensions of the study and evaluation of social development

This article discusses, from a historical perspective, the dimensions of the study and assessment of the phenomenon known as "social development". Three levels of analysis were used: perspective, retrospective, and prospective. This emphasizes the theoretical and doctrinal settings, in their application as a core objective of contemporary social policy, and their possible settings as "integral human development", a heuristic paradigm that can help define and delimit the latest content of the debated social question of the 21st century.