Police organizations are unlikely to consider the future or to plan for social change because they typically operate under norms of organizational rationality which permit adaptation to its changing environment and because of the difficulty of forecasting the future of policing. The major starting point in planning for the future is a design for what is desired of the organization and its accomplishments at different future times, followed by the creation of plans to achieve the design. Research and development are crucial for designing and implementing a planned future. Research involves empirical investigation that explains how things behave and change their behavior. Research may range from basic research on how organizations are changed, their relationship to their environment, to applied research that evaluates the intended and unintended consequences of a particular program of social change. Development implies repeated efforts to achieve a desired goal. Were police organizations to accept a research mandate, they would both anticipate the future and plan for its change by setting new goals based on research. The police can influence social change by using their expertise in analyzing the consequences for the nature and distribution of criminal behavior of various planned social changes, such as zoning and the decriminalization of various offenses. The nature of the police role in social change depends upon the willingness of governments to broaden the role of the police in using social change as a means of dealing with social control problems. A conference discussion of the paper and 13 references are provided.