How historical analysis can enrich scenario planning

Abstract

Historians and scenario planners both examine societal developments over time, but from opposite vantage points. One group looks backward, the other forward. This paper argues that a deeper understanding of the methods and approaches of historical analysis can help scenario planners to develop better insights into the world ahead. The study of history stretches back millennia, while disciplined scenario planning has been around for half a century. By comparing historical analysis with scenario planning, the paper extracts lessons to improve narratives about possible futures, with linkages to the emerging field of counterfactual history. The practical challenges are examined using a 1992 scenario project about South Africa's future post-apartheid. Reviewing the four scenarios developed then, with the benefit of hindsight now, shows how and why historical thinking can sharpen scenario-oriented studies of the future.

Intensifying intellectual traffic between history and futures studies: A commentary on Schoemaker 2020

“…This commentary is written as much for individuals already established in the field as it is for scholars beyond the relatively small world of futures studies. In addition to underscoring the programmatic agenda for research implied by Schoemaker's (2020) new work and the curricular implications of the article for how students of futures and history are trained, our reply provides additional context regarding the scholarly conversations and scientific controversies that animate and bring meaning to research in futures studies and provides us with our collective sense of self as an academic community. At core, the notion that learning about the construction of history aids in constructing futures (e.g., through scenario planning), and, in parallel, that learning about the construction of futures aids in (re)constructing the past (e.g., through historical assessment), implicates a symbiotic analytical and academic practice world at the interface between history and futures studies that has yet to be realized through intensified intellectual traffic between these two mutually reinforcing enterprises.…”

“…The claim periodically resurfaces, reiterated, for example, by Bradfield (2008), Bradfield, Derbyshire, and Wright (2016), and Derbyshire (2016a, 2016b). Thus, we did not deem the “the field to be in a dismal state of intellectual development,” or, if we did, we did so reasons that will become apparent (Schoemaker, 2020:6).…”

“…In “How Historical Analysis Can Enrich Scenario Planning,” Schoemaker (2020) has joined—and possibly surpassed—Staley (2002, 2010) as a primary proponent of futures scholars and practitioners adopting aspects of historical analysis in the development of scenarios and other visions of futures. Schoemaker's articulated emphasis on the mutually productive scholarly interface between counterfactual reasoning (see, for example, Collins, Hall, & Paul, 2004; Evans, 2014; King & Zeng, 2006; Lewis, 1973; Morgan & Winship, 2015) and the development of scenarios (see, for example, Chermack, 2011; van der Heijden, 2005; Ramirez & Wilkinson, 2016; Ringland, 2006) is as convincing as it is programmatically useful.…”

“…To this end, we contextualize a statement made in Schoemaker’s (2020:6) article about the “state of intellectual development” in scenario planning. After describing how scenario planning, as a process, unfolds in a series of sequential steps (see, also, Ramirez & Selin, 2014; Rowland & Spaniol, 2017), Schoemaker (2020:6) admits that “the extent to which scenario planning has evolved into a well‐grounded science, with empirical tests and validated concepts or principles, remains open to debate.” This is true.…”

Can we accelerate learning from history? South Africa then and now: Commentary on Schoemaker 2020

“…We can learn a lot about how hard it is to learn from history by examining hard cases. And Paul Schoemaker (2020) highlights a challenging case: the Mont Fleur scenarios developed in 1991–1992 “to stimulate constructive debate” among diverse stakeholders in South Africa about how best to shape the 10 years post‐apartheid. The effort was a well‐intentioned exercise to sketch a shared roadmap into a murky future.…”