What can historians offer policymakers?

To some, even asking this question goes against the nature of history. After all, they argue, history should not have to offer policymakers anything. History is not a service industry; it is an intellectual pursuit. Historians should be engaged in a study of the past with as little thought to the present as humanly possible.

While I see the value of this kind of thinking, and certainly believe that historians should strive for objectivity and search out the truth about the past as far as possible, there is another way of looking as the discipline of history. After all, policymakers and the rest of society do take something from history, and they do it even if they do not realize it. It is simply not possible to remove oneself from one's own context and reality (political affiliation, personal history, occupation, country of residence, gender, age, etc.), and to have one's own worldviews not colour in some way how one sees the world. This is not a condemnation; it is just the way things are. We are always in some way connected with the present.

If historians don't take time out of their busy talking-to-other-historians schedules to counsel policymakers and the public, then others will do that job for them. I don't mean to say that all historians need to be publicly engaged, but it is vital that some are. And "some" probably means more than are doing it now. How often do we see commentators with a political axe to grind misusing history to serve their partisan purposes? Too often, I think. Of course this will always happen, but if more historians were actively engaged in educating the public about the past with an eye to, yes, influencing present-day thinking, then maybe, just maybe, the world would be a better place. The truth may not set us free---and not only because historians often disagree---but more self-awareness is always better than less. More understanding of where we have been, why past generations followed certain paths and where this lead them can only be a positive thing. And since many historians, whatever their natural aversion to commenting on the present, spend their professional lives thoughtfully considering and passing judgment on past policy decisions, it is incumbent upon some of them to weigh in on important contemporary issues. After all, more informed commentary is always better than less.

I could go on, but you get my point. Any thoughts?