Search

Due to rapid change and wicked policy problems, anticipatory policymaking is increasingly important. In addition to methods for producing foresight knowledge, tools are needed to make sense of the increasing amounts of future-oriented argumentation. This article presents a comparative analysis of anticipatory argumentation in two fields: the EU data protection reform and the Finnish concept for comprehensive security. A three-layer heuristic framework is presented for qualitative analysis of statements on plausible futures. The first layer consists of specific expectations regarding the future. The second layer is the generic anticipatory storyline. The third layer consists of the underlying futures consciousness. The data protection case presents an institutional reform narrative with short time perspective and relatively high agency, while the comprehensive security case presents a crisis narrative based on a contingency planning orientation with long time perspective, relatively developed systems perception and relatively low agency. In policy foresight with high uncertainty and high aspirations of agency, reflexivity and ethical responsibility are crucial components of foresight. This article promotes these by providing a tool for structuring anticipatory assumptions. The tool can be used for studying policy documents or during the policy process to craft more rigorous future-oriented policies. • Statements on plausible futures contain embedded anticipatory assumptions. • A three-layer structure can be used to study and craft future-oriented policies. • EU data protection reform presents a policy reform narrative with high agency. • Finnish comprehensive security foresight presents a crisis narrative with low agency. • Transparency of assumptions, reflexivity and responsibility are crucial in foresight. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • There is no commonly used, operational definition of future consciousness that could be used in empirical futures research. • Future consciousness overlaps with many other related concepts, such as future orientation and anticipation. • Our review and analysis of these concepts identify five different dimensions that are central to future consciousness. • The resulting model is called the Five Dimensions of Futures Consciousness. • The dimensions are time perspective, agency beliefs, openness to alternatives, systems perception and concern for others. Abstract Futures research studies and builds images of possible, probable and preferable futures and paths to such futures. Underlying this effort is human consciousness of futures that is present in everyday anticipatory behaviour and explicit foresight. Futures researchers often aim to increase this consciousness in order to enable decision-making towards more desirable futures. Despite the importance of the concept of Futures Consciousness, and the proliferation of related concepts, there is no commonly used definition or operationalization that would permit empirical research. This article presents a conceptual model of Futures Consciousness that is based on an integrated review and analysis of the descriptions of future consciousness and its related concepts in literature as well as in the theoretical underpinnings of futures research. The model contains five dimensions: 1) Time perspective, 2) Agency beliefs, 3) Openness to alternatives, 4) Systems perception and 5) Concern for others. The model provides the basis for further conceptual development and the operationalization of Futures Consciousness, which would enable its use in empirical research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the results of an innovative pilot experiment on elaborating transformative energy scenarios by using a causal layered analysis (CLA) game. CLA is an integrative and communicative method, which divides issues into four layers: litany, systemic causes, worldviews, and metaphors. In the piloted CLA game, four existing scenario drafts from the Neo-Carbon Energy project: “Radical Startups”, “Value-Driven Techemoths”, “Green DIY Engineers” and “New Consciousness” were used. The CLA game session, as depicted in this paper, worked through the CLA layers sequentially per each scenario, contributed new elements to the scenario narratives, and utilised roleplay for the worldview and metaphor layers. This CLA game highlighted the complexity, polyphony and actor dynamics of the future worlds. We identify four key benefits: developing the CLA game scenario methodology, gaming-based social learning, deepening of sociocultural energy scenario drafts and exploration of energy transformation toward renewable energy based futures. As a new type of CLA workshop, the game expanded the method's boundaries. Recommendations are presented for developing serious gaming further in scenario processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In an uncertain and increasingly interdependent world, cross-sectoral policy foresight is needed to tackle complex phenomena. However, most existing foresight studies have focused on a single sector or domain. This article adopts a systems perspective and explores knowledge creation, capabilities, and relations in a distributed policy foresight system cutting across government sectors and national, regional, and local administrative levels. The article is based on empirical material collected in Finland in 2019, describing the Finnish policy foresight system's existing organizational and systemic foresight capacities. Our results indicate that policy foresight considers relatively narrow future horizons relying heavily on futures knowledge that is accessible in the immediate operating environment. The full potential of foresight is not utilized. Distributed foresight collaboration at the systems level is hindered by lack of coherence, coordination, and collaboration structures. We propose ways to improve the foresight system's performance and point to ecosystem literature as a productive direction for foresight research to further the paradigm of distributed foresight systems. • There is little empirical research on multi-actor foresight systems. • We present an empirical study of the Finnish policy foresight system. • We provide an overview of foresight knowledge creation, capabilities, and relations. • We explore organizing policy foresight as an ecosystem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the metaphorical messages and interpretations of futuristic buildings and construction projects, with examples from several parts of the world, especially from Europe and Asia. Based on the research material gathered in the MEDEIA project, some examples of buildings representing various metaphors will be provided together with reflections on their implications and interpretations from an individual and societal point of view. 1 1 The origin of this article derives from the presentation held at the seminar of the Finnish Society for Futures Studies in August 2014 ( Heinonen, 2014 ). The method of causal layered analysis (CLA) is applied in the analysis to deconstruct the messages of the buildings and to illustrate the connections between their manifest appearance and the underlying metaphors. The article addresses two central questions. Firstly, how does a building, in addition to its main functions, act as a messenger and mediator of future-related meanings by embodying different types of metaphors? Secondly, which kinds of buildings present conventional metaphors and used futures, and which kinds of buildings suggest novel metaphors and alternative futures? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This special issue, as might be expected in a networked world, searching for proof that collaboration can work, is edited by four of us. It began with a conversation in 2014 over bland conference food in Helsinki between Osmo Kuusi, Matti Minkkinen and Sohail Inayatullah about the need to highlight metaphors in futures research. We noted that while extensively used, they remain inadequately theorized and lacking mindfulness. Further conversations between Inayatullah and Aleksandra Izgarjan focused the issue. We introduce the special issue with short openings by each one of us, theorizing in a biographical context. These are followed by a summary of the articles, essays, and reports, written by Minkkinen. Our intent is not just to focus on metaphors in futures research, but as well to see futures research as narrative-based itself: as not just describing reality and possibility but creating new worlds, on opening up of shared pathways. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The future of privacy is a topical issue in the context of debates on mass surveillance and the increasing prevalence of social media sites in everyday life. Previous scenario studies on privacy have focused on macro trends and on forecasting technological developments, and claims about causal influences have remained implicit. This article presents an alternative approach for constructing scenarios of privacy protection. The article focuses on privacy protection as a social institution and builds on the theory of gradual institutional change. The article presents a scenario framework which includes three stages: (1) outlining the dynamics of privacy protection, (2) tracing historical processes and constructing a causal narrative, and (3) creating event-based scenarios. The resulting scenarios are narratives of plausible chains of events which are based on the results of the previous stages. The key difference to typical scenario approaches is the focus on specific actors and types of event sequences in privacy protection. The argument is that by lowering the level of abstraction in this way, researchers and decision-makers can gain a more profound understanding of possible future challenges in privacy protection and of key leverage points in the institutional change process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• The article reviews concepts from social and personality psychology that have been used in the five-dimensional Futures Consciousness Scale. • The five dimensions of futures consciousness describe the individual differences that affect how an individual projects the self and potential futures. • The article provides ideas and sources for those interested in the different dimensions of Futures Consciousness or working with the FC Scale. • This contribution should be especially relevant to research on human interaction with future and the currently popular study of anticipation, anticipatory behaviour and futures literacy. Future consciousness refers to the human capacity to understand, anticipate, prepare for, and embrace the future. The Futures Consciousness Scale has recently been developed to enable empirical study of the phenomenon among individuals. The scale is based on a five-dimensional model of Futures Consciousness (FC) that encompasses: i) Time Perspective, ii) Agency Beliefs, iii) Openness to Alternatives, iv) Systems Perception, and v) Concern for Others. The present article reviews the psychological theories, concepts and constructs that underlie the FC Scale in depth. It examines how the five dimensions could be manifested in individual behaviour, how they relate to each other and to other psychological phenomena. Furthermore, the article provides ideas and sources for researchers and practitioners interested in the concept of FC or in using the FC Scale in research or in educational settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Foresight is conducted in diverse ways drawing on particular sets of assumptions, and it increasingly takes place in networked foresight systems. We develop a typology of six foresight frames based on two dimensions: 1) level of perceived unpredictability and 2) level of pursued change. By frames, we mean the interpretive structures that underlie foresight actors' work. The six foresight frames are the predictive, planning, scenaric, visionary, critical and transformative frames. The frames may be used to position phases of foresight, individual processes or, most usefully, interlinked foresight processes in a system. We develop the model based on futures literature and elaborate it in a study of comprehensive security foresight in Finland conducted during the Strategic Research Council project "From Failand to Winland". Moreover, we test our typology with four additional foresight system cases: Singapore, United Kingdom, Wallonia and Russia. The six frames capture different sets of assumptions and different types of foresight which can be distributed to different actors in a foresight system. Thus we suggest that diversity of foresight frames is likely to be an element of successful foresight systems. However, this requires understanding the diversity of foresight frames and the competence to bridge different approaches. • Foresight is conducted in numerous ways by networked actors • Six foresight frames are developed based on a literature review • The foresight frames are elaborated in Finnish comprehensive security foresight • The foresight frames are tentatively tested on four other foresight system cases • Awareness about different approaches is necessary for rigorous foresight systems [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Futures Consciousness (FC) refers to the capacity that a person has for understanding, anticipating, and preparing for the future. In many respects, the COVID-19 pandemic has been a challenge for future thinking, implying delay discounting, uncertainty, low sense of control, and self-sacrifice for the benefit of the community at large. FC might hence have an important role in explaining people's perceptions of and reactions to the pandemic. The results of a longitudinal study over the course of the summer 2020 found that UK participants (N = 298) who reported higher scores of FC at the first time of measure were more likely to express greater satisfaction and engagement with the COVID-19 government restrictions at the second time of measure. They also reported higher compassion for others, stronger sense of neighbourliness, and greater engagement in different forms of collective action. This positive engagement translated in benefit for the self: greater perceived wellbeing, lesser emotional blunting, and greater feelings of hope about the future. Remarkably, the same participants also reported greater concern about societal issues. It hence seems that FC triggers an active and aware engagement with the future. We discuss implications for future-thinking research and interventions aiming to improve Futures Consciousness. • Futures Consciousness (FC) is the capacity to understand and prepare for the future. • In many respects, the COVID-19 pandemic has been a challenge for future thinking. • A longitudinal study in the UK in the summer 2020 tested the effect of higher FC. • Higher FC translated in higher compassion, personal wellbeing, and hope. • FC triggers an active and aware engagement with the future in challenging times. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]