Findings und Learnings of Futures Literacy for Civil Society
Do we really build castles in the sky, daydream away and imagine unattainable utopias? When I talk about the fact that we at SUPERRR contextualise digital policy issues for society as a whole with the aim of creating fairer and more diverse visions of the future, many people dismiss this as feminist la-di-da and wishful thinking.
But why is that? Why are we so much more willing to believe oft-cited commonplaces and declare current conditions to be immutable facts? And this despite the fact that we see and experience every day that our familiar ways of thinking and approaches do not work - they neither provide real solutions to the much-vaunted polycrises nor work towards futures that prioritise security, justice and care for all people, our environment and our ecosystem.
The narratives we have as a society determine how we look at the world, what and how we think and (can) imagine. Conversely, the way we think and imagine determines these narratives - and thus also manifests our realities. Instead of creating courageous visions, we primarily see narratives that fuel the status quo and thus establish injustices, power relations, racism, exploitation, you name it, as supposedly inevitable continuities. This is systematic and not only restricts our options for action, but is also a great legitimisation strategy to get us out of responsibility. After all, if life isn't fair anyway, isn't a pony farm and isn't a dream come true, why muster the strength to rebel against injustice? If everyone is closest to themselves and the architect of their own happiness, we are fuelling the capitalist machinery, profit and performance logic, but not the care and mindfulness that makes it possible to pause critically or break free. Hopefully it will become clear here at the latest that the stories, headlines and so-called (mega)trends that we are confronted with every day are by no means neutral, but are driven by a variety of interests.
So what does this mean for our futuring work at SUPERRR? In our Futures Literacy for Civil Society pilot programme, we worked with 12 civil society organisations to build futures literacy and develop alternative and desirable visions that we can strategically work towards.
The initial aim was to make visible that dominant narratives are not simply there, but pursue interests, focus on certain values and norms, perspectives and positions, and leave others out. Because this also means that they can be changed and shaped! There are many futuring methods that support a power-critical and intersectional analysis of narratives. For example, the Causal Layered Analysis method by scientist and futurist Sohail Inayatullah, which makes it possible to unravel implicit layers of meaning in a narrative in order to develop alternatives. Or the Critiquing Futures method, developed by my colleague Quincey Stumptner and Feven Keleta, which enables an awareness of gaps and biases through its questioning approach. What kind of power relations can be found in these future scenarios? What expressed and unspoken assumptions and values are there? For and with which people and groups of people?
It is deeply political who thinks about futures, who imagines, longs for, plans and creates them. And whoever has the time, resources and living conditions to work towards these futures. A challenge that we also clearly felt in our programme. Civil society organisations are often not only preoccupied with current grievances and damage limitation, but are also caught in a limbo of fundraising and political pressure to justify themselves, and in the worst cases, hostility. This particularly affects organisations that are led by marginalised people and communities and/or that campaign for their rights. We can only mitigate the structural hurdles, systemic disadvantages and multiple burdens to a very limited extent. Nevertheless, we have tried: for example, by compensating volunteer participants for their time; responding as specifically as possible to the needs and questions of the participants; creating as safe a space as possible for all participants; and even now, after the end of the programme, trying to continue to support the participants as much as possible.
Unfortunately, this is much less of a pony farm than I would like it to be. Because sustainable implementation and support for strategic and methodological futuring work in organisations requires more resources than is currently the case. I am grateful for the commitment of the participants, the food for thought, the exchange of knowledge, the presence in the room - despite all the adversities. But if inclusion and diversity are to be more than just buzzwords, we need a different framework and structural support that explicitly promotes this type of work, especially for marginalised communities. In concrete terms, this means: more money, long-term planning for the organisation and its employees, less workload, safety and recognition, etc., so that these spaces for knowledge transfer and joint political work can become a reality. If we really want to build fairer futures, we need diverse perspectives, ideas, visions and spaces in which these futures can already be embodied - in the here and now.
Futuring takes time. And so, after the three joint training sessions, it feels as if we have only just got started. The future muscle has been trained, we have tried out different methods, strengthened our imaginative power and designed joint scenarios, but regular and continuous practice is needed for sustainable integration. Monthly imagination meditations, regular meet-ups in which participants bring topics and cases from their daily work, or a futuring retreat? We don't have a final answer yet, but are deciding step by step and in dialogue with the participants what further development and collaboration could look like.
Many of the organisations are planning or even already in the process of using futures methods for their strategic work, thought-provoking impulses and ideas are being discussed in work teams, voluntary collectives and in private contexts, and the first project applications with a focus on futures processes are already on their way. What is emerging are the first experimental arrangements, the first steps towards desirable futures.
Damage limitation and combating symptoms does not promise a cure. So it may be time to build these castles in the air after all.