How can we solve problems in the society that cause socio economic crises such as the one of 2008? Here we introduce the subject of this special issue, ‘physics of societies’, dealing with a general introduction to the subject, and the particular special issue projects’ presentation, explaining why this subject is important to the scientific community and to the society, what are the problems that we can deal better using these approaches, and what can be suggested to do next in practice. We emphasize the strength of physics of socio-economic systems to treat problems in nations that are not solved with other approaches, and that these results can indeed affect the people, in particular with intervention schemes that support creating managed organizations, including support from socio-economic-organizations, for instance.