Futures最新文献

In face of the ecological and social emergencies, how the French contemporary mobilizations against injustices does address the issue of a fair and sustainable future? We will answer this question from a qualitative survey conducted in 2019–2020 of 130 association officials and activists on social and environmental justice, fight against racism, sexism, and /or speciesism. These mobilisations combine a radical denunciation of inequalities that goes back to their root causes with an attachment to fluidity concerning the “who”, the “what”, the “how” and the “when” of emancipation. We will examine in particular the way in which the emancipated common is part of a radical and fluid renewal of the relation to utopia by promoting both the diversity of tactics (advocacy, civil disobedience, border violence/non-violence) and the making (in) common. The activists interviewed address the link between local alternatives and the advent of a new global order in an elliptical, even enigmatic way, through metaphorical statements – “no big night, but shared gardens”, “the islets will make the archipelagos”.

Exploratory scenarios based on participatory approaches proved helpful in dealing with uncertainty and complexity in urban and transport systems. Such scenarios usually create coherent and manageable narratives that capture broad patterns and trends at global scales. However, significant difficulties exist in bridging exploratory scenario narratives with spatial and local realities, which is crucial for guiding policymaking in urban, regional, and mobility planning. This paper explores whether and how exploratory scenario narratives and participatory mapping processes can establish a reciprocal relationship, wherein narrative-based maps contribute to spatially shaping scenario narratives. It uses an experimental approach involving three participatory workshops with experts and local stakeholders specifically tailored to the mapping of land use and transportation-related scenario narratives for the year 2050 in the Henares Corridor (Madrid, Spain). The spatial transformations mapped during workshops have indicated that participatory mapping processes have an impact on scenario narratives in different ways, enabling the identification of three categories of mapping episodes with different meanings: (i) complementing narratives, (ii) expanding narratives, and (iii) modifying narratives. The paper closes by examining the implications of the obtained findings for policymaking, including a reflection on the research’s limitations and potential for application in real-world planning processes.

From charting out climate change mitigation pathways to estimating price risks associated with the social cost of carbon, as environmentally concerned citizens of the twenty-first century, we live in a culture of foresight. Because of a growing integration of an ever-wider sample space of possible climate futures into the present, historical experience has become seemingly irrelevant for effectively predicting where our climate transitions are headed, in effect restricting our sense of futurity to its performativity in the present. What has been surprisingly absent as a theoretical and methodological approach among sociologists, however, are treatments of the performativity of the future as the expression of a historical praxis for prognosis, with its own mode of disclosure. By interrogating the temporal structure of anticipation that characterizes computer-based simulations of emissions scenarios, the paper illustrates how this praxis discloses the future in accordance with the grammatical tense of the future perfect. It then argues that this relationship between past and future is the cultural product of a historically particular set of prognostic techniques and technologies, namely, model-based scenario analysis. Against this background, the paper seeks to contribute to the rehabilitation of the relevance of historical experience by historicizing the social ontological status of the future that theories of performativity take as their starting point.

Futures imagined in scenario processes reflect both stakeholder perspectives and broader societal imaginaries: collectively-held, institutionally-stabilized visions of the future. The presence of imaginaries has mostly remained implicit in studies of scenario planning, especially in development contexts. We argue that scenario planning will benefit from reflexivity regarding imaginaries. Here, reflexivity refers to an awareness regarding different perspectives, assumptions, values, and—oft-hidden—politics at play. We developed a framework of relevant imaginaries and assessed how and to what extent these are expressed in scenario narratives, through analyzing seven scenario sets focused on agriculture, food security and climate change in the Global South. Our results show that neoliberal and sustainable development imaginaries are dominant in these scenarios. Imaginaries from the Global South are scarcely represented—arguably because of that, we observe few regional perspectives on potential challenges in these scenario sets. We conclude that the scenario sets offer effective critique on neoliberal mechanisms and global development dynamics, but do not provide significant room for transformational alternatives from the Global South. We argue that opening up explorative scenario planning to more pluralistic conceptions of the future can greatly enhance its reflexivity, and a representative mix of imaginaries allows for scenario planning that leads to more transformational policies.

Future experts, decision-makers, stakeholders and future citizens – they all go to school, which could be a place to prepare students to facing post-normal problems in their future roles. While the literature on mathematics and science education shows increased interest in post-normal science to critically understand contemporary problems, mathematics is still generally taught as a neutral subject with either correct or wrong answers. In this paper, I lean on post-normal science literature and the slowly growing literature on ethics and mathematics education to develop a framework for identifying how mathematics education can prepare students for ethical aspects of post-normal problems. Three areas of ethics associated with post-normal problems are explored through concepts from ethics and mathematics education: ethical perspectives of the problem, ethical perspectives embedded in knowledge, and ethics in interpersonal care in discussions and care for students’ self-esteem in participatory processes. This framework is used to analyse and discuss three classroom projects to provide examples of what these areas may contain. The projects partly align with post-normal science, and are about clothing and sustainability, traffic safety, and argumentation related to open an offshore area to oil exploitation. The ethical areas are discussed in terms of ethical awareness and democratic practices.

Social movement scholarship has long attempted to apprehend the dynamic qualities of social movements. Considering the temporal embeddedness of social movement activities is essential because it leads to an understanding of continuity and change in the content and form of social movements in the long run. Because the past, the present, and the future are co-defined, more attention should be paid to the way different time frames shape one another. In this article, we focus our attention on the influence of visions of the future on present practices. Drawing on qualitative research mainly in Belgium, France, and Germany, we explore how projected climate-just futures influence the practices of grassroots climate justice organizations in the present. For this purpose, we center our analysis on a macro-level vision that depicts a climate-just world as a world where domination systems (aka. capitalism, colonialism, or patriarchy) have been replaced in order to let a more egalitarian society strive. We use the concept of prefiguration to illustrate how this vision transforms organizing and mobilizing activities. Such transformative effects are exemplified in attempts at developing an alternative organizational culture and building alliances with marginalized groups, with more or less success.

The recent growing concerns surrounding the pervasive adoption of generative AI can be traced back to the long-standing influence of AI algorithms that have predominantly served as content curators on large online platforms. These algorithms are used by online services and platforms to decide what content to show and in what order, and they can have a negative impact, including the spread of misinformation, social polarization, and echo chambers around important topics. Frances Haugen, a former Facebook employee turned whistleblower, has drawn significant public attention to this issue by revealing the company's alleged knowledge about the negative impacts of their own algorithms. Additionally, a recent initiative to ban TikTok as a threat to US national security indicates the influence of recommender systems. The objective of this study is threefold. The first goal is to provide an exhaustive evaluation of the profound worldwide influence exerted by algorithm-based recommendations. The second goal is to determine the degree of priority accorded by the scientific community to pivotal subjects in recommender systems discussions, such as misinformation, polarization, addiction, emotional contagion, privacy, and bias. Finally, the third goal is to assess whether the level of scientific research and discourse is commensurate with the significant impact these recommendation systems have globally. The research concludes the impact of recommender systems on society has been largely neglected by the scientific community, despite the fact that more than half of the world's population interacts with them on a daily basis. This becomes especially apparent when considering that algorithms exert influence not just on major societal issues but on every aspect of a user's online experience. The potential consequences for humanity are discussed, such as addiction to technology, weakening relations between humans, and the homogenizing effects on human minds. One possible direction to address the challenges posed by these algorithms is the application of algorithmic regulation to promote content diversity and facilitate democratic engagement, such as the tripartite solution which is elaborated upon in the conclusion. Therefore, future research should not only be centered around further evaluating influence of this technology, but also the analysis of how such systems can be regulated. A broader conversation among all stakeholders should be evoked on these potential approaches, aiming to align AI with societal values and enhance human well-being.

ChatGPT is changing our working lives, conjuring visions of revolutionary shifts ahead. ChatGPT is a chatbot based on generative artificial intelligence, which can, e.g., write computer code. This article explores how it might shape the future labour market situation of software engineers. A Delphi study with 14 experts was conducted in Finland. The first round identified possible futures, and the second round assessed their probabilities. Five scenarios prevailed: the unlikely scenario that the status quo persists; the ambivalent scenario that ChatGPT can replace software engineers to a large extent; the likely scenario that computer departments in startups embrace ChatGPT; the likely scenario that ChatGPT use proliferates among software engineers to increase productivity; and the highly likely scenario that ChatGPT makes computer programming accessible to the masses. Findings contradict previous discussions that technological advancements might take over especially routine tasks. ChatGPT can also take over non-routine tasks. Moreover, findings underline that digitalisation does not only bring about a choice between upskilling and employability loss, but also a democratisation of knowledge and expertise. Software engineers and companies might use the findings as an impetus for upskilling, while universities might feel nudged to incorporate ChatGPT more strongly into their curricula.

Decentralized and small-scale forms of organization are reappearing in Spanish’s energy system. Co-operatives have a social approach based on three dimensions: the purpose of the initiative, the form of organization and ownership, and embeddedness. In this paper, we apply this analytical framework to twelve energy co-operatives in Spain. These collectively owned organizations are energy-marketing communities, and they have specific objectives: These are an ecological objective (to reduce energy consumption and generate renewable energy) and a social objective (to propose an alternative to the reality of the energy market and citizen empowerment). Energy co-operatives in Spain have been typified as social enterprises, and these social enterprises have experience in common energy service, with which they may mark their future role in local energy communities. These results show the consolidation of energy co-operatives as a sign of the maturity of Spanish society in the face of energy challenges.

Hong Kong's 2019 protests sparked public concern about the city's future. This study aimed to investigate the relationship between Hong Kong residents' personal futures (PF) and their perceptions of the city's collective future (CF), and how these views connect to well-being and career decisions. We surveyed 266 Cantonese-speaking Hong Kong residents aged 18–64. Our findings revealed a weak positive correlation between PF and CF, with PF being generally more positive. Stronger views on both PF and CF were linked to better well-being. Interestingly, positive PF (but not CF) predicted higher career decisiveness. Importantly, the strength of the PF/CF association was greater for those who strongly identified with Hong Kong. Our results suggest that even amidst social unrest, individuals may retain optimism about their personal futures while holding a less optimistic view of their city's collective future, and these views can influence career decision-making.