Futures literacy and the diversity of the future

Mangnus, Astrid; Oomen, Jeroen; Vervoort, Joost; Hajer, Maarten

doi:10.1016/j.futures.2021.102793

Cited by 59 publications

(30 citation statements)

References 46 publications

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“…Food policy development processes using immersive foresight methods with diverse groups of food stakeholders build consensus among decision makers on pathways for sustainable food governance that avoid path dependency 76,80 . Adapting and shaping uncertain futures highlights the need to build anticipatory capacities and futures literacy for policymakers and agrifood system actors at large 81 . For organizing viable distributed agrifood systems and networks under such circumstances, best practices from cybernetics and related fields will prove vital to help the coordination of governance and integrative policies across scales.…”

Section: Post-growth Agrifood Systems In Actionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sustainable agrifood systems for a post-growth world

et al. 2022

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Sustainable agrifood systems are critical to averting climate-driven social and ecological disasters, overcoming the growth paradigm and redefining the interactions of humanity and nature in the twenty-first century. This Perspective describes an agenda and examples for comprehensive agrifood system redesign according to principles of sufficiency, regeneration, distribution, commons and care. This redesign should be supported by coordinated education and research efforts that do not simply replicate dominant discourses on food system sustainability but point towards a post-growth world in which agroecological life processes support healthy communities rather than serving as inputs for the relentless pursuit of economic growth.

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Section: Post-growth Agrifood Systems In Actionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sustainable agrifood systems for a post-growth world

et al. 2022

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“…As Mangnus et al (2021) note, two questions feature centrally in FL: Q1. How are futures conceptualised and framed?…”

Section: Futures Literacymentioning

confidence: 99%

Integrating crisis learning into futures literacy – exploring the “new normal” and imagining post-pandemic futures

Karjalainen

Mwagiru

Salminen

et al. 2022

OTH

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Purpose Crises are major events or periods faced by individuals, groups and society. This paper aims to explore the value of facilitating (un)learning in and from crises. Educators have a key role in building futures literacy (FL) for dealing with uncertainties, understanding emergence and responding to rapid, complex change. Integrating crisis learning as part of FL is important for enhanced anticipatory and crisis responses. Design/methodology/approach Adapting from causal layered analysis (CLA) methodology, experimental virtual futures workshops were designed and hosted during the coronavirus pandemic. Participants discussed COVID-19 crisis responses and imagined the “new normal”. Sessions explored mindsets applied to make sense and derive meaning from the crisis, myriad ways of adapting to uncertainty, as well as lenses used to imagine post-crisis futures. Findings In the exploratory and participatory CLA exercises, participants shared on the COVID-19 pandemic and imagined post-crisis futures. Related hopes and fears concerned self, collectives and nature. Overall, despite the dramatic nature of crises, opportunities exist for learning and transformation. Educators play a central role in heightening awareness about the dynamics and nature of crises, and integrating crisis learning into FL, as important and transformative capabilities. Research limitations/implications In exploratory dialogues, the “new normal” was applied as a frame for uncertainty. The workshops were hosted during the COVID-19 pandemic as a specific type of crisis. The workshop design is intended to be replicable in various crisis contexts and for iterative rounds with diverse groups. Therefore, futures images exemplify context-specific crisis-time sentiments. The findings presented here do not aim to be generalizable. They are liable to change across different crises, as a crisis evolves and across diverse stakeholders. Practical implications Dramatic change and crisis events offer potential moments for development, advancement and transformation. Educators have an important role in facilitating (un)learning in and from crises, elevating FL and expanding futures consciousness. The CLA methodology can assist educators to engage with multiple facets, layers and dimensions of crises. By considering crises intently, educators can help in anticipating emergence, imagining and preparing for diverse alternatives. Social implications The contemporary world is volatile, complex and ambiguous volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous (VUCA), as revealed by multiple crises. Crises can spotlight new possibilities and horizons and may be possible turning points. The COVID-19 is an example of a crisis disruption, which provoked thinking and contributed to action about novel prospects. To realise transformative change however, it is important to integrate crisis learning as part of FL, and here educators are an important influence. Originality/value Integrating crisis learning into FL is proposed to improve responses to the rapid pace of change and uncertainty as well as to boost crisis preparedness. As part of this, there is value in applying and developing techniques such as CLA that help explore and question assumptions, to understand diverse, possible and transformed futures. This way, we can explore, imagine and expand new horizons.

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“…Yet, with quantitative techniques of futuring, only a very narrow image of the future can be depicted. Thus, there is a need for a more encompassing toolbox that provides alternative forms and processes to think about the future that are appropriate to the complexity of problems we are facing with the issues such as climate change (Mangnus et al, 2021;Oomen et al, 2022, p. 15). The idea that one mode of imagining the future is insufficient for the issues we are facing when it comes to "wicked problems" such as sustainability also underlies the argument of Mangnus et al (2021, p. 4).…”

Section: Imagining As Form and Processmentioning

confidence: 99%

Materials and modes of translation: Re-imagining inclusive “zero”-waste futures

Eijnden

Baibarac-Duignan²,

Lange³

et al. 2022

Front. Sustain. Cities

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In this paper, we present and reflect upon a creative and participatory approach for engaging citizens in imagining desirable “zero”-waste futures that include different values and perspectives. The approach emerged through a 4-month collaboration involving academic researchers and creative professionals and was prototyped in a formerly industrial neighborhood of Utrecht (het Werkspoorkwartier), currently being developed as a creative circular manufacturing area. With our approach, we inquire into and provide an alternative to predominant technology-centered policy visions, which portray the issues of waste as objective challenges that can be addressed through data-driven technological solutions. Such visions neglect many other perspectives and values, particularly those of citizens that face the issue of waste in everyday life, thus providing only a narrow vision of how the future might look like. To gather and articulate different perspectives on alternative “zero”-waste futures, we focus on citizen-science-inspired and speculative design methods to engage people and stimulate imagining futures that bring to light diverse values and perspectives. In the development of the methods, we work in close collaboration with creative practitioners, both in terms of anchoring the research in a real-world context and in terms of combining our different types of expertise. Reflecting on the project, we discuss the potential of our transdisciplinary approach and the co-produced methods to intervene in how we see and imagine alternative futures. We do so by taking “translation” as an analytical lens to understand how different meanings and visions are created through experiential, material, and affective modes of expression. Specifically, we will analyze the translations that occur in the processes of moving from abstract data to matters of concern, and from desirable futures to actionable presents. Looking at these multiple processes through the lens of translation will serve to investigate how different future imaginaries are generated through different materials and modalities of translation, offering different forms of engagement in shaping inclusive urban futures. Translation here will be conceptualized less as a perfect transference of information and more as an open-ended process of paying attention to different values, and identifying those matters for which to care for in our urban futures.

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Futures literacy and the diversity of the future

Cited by 59 publications

References 46 publications

Sustainable agrifood systems for a post-growth world

Sustainable agrifood systems for a post-growth world

Integrating crisis learning into futures literacy – exploring the “new normal” and imagining post-pandemic futures

Materials and modes of translation: Re-imagining inclusive “zero”-waste futures

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