Making Sense Of The Future

207 Pages·2022·3.429 MB·English

by  Rick Szostak

MAKING SENSE OF THE FUTURE
Making Sense of the Future integrates the latest thinking in Future Studies with the
author’s expertise in world history, economics, interdisciplinary studies, knowledge
organization, and political activism.
The book takes a systems approach that recognizes the complexity of our world.
It begins by suggesting a set of goals for human societies and identifying innovative
strategies for achieving these goals that could gain broad support. Each chapter
begins with a “How to” section that discusses how we can identify goals, strategies,
trends, surprises, or implementation strategies and concludes with an integrative
analysis that draws connections across the preceding discussions. Taking a cross-
disciplinary approach, Szostak explores key trends and how these interact so that
we can develop strategies to guide trends towards desirable futures. He discusses
the ways in which we can best prepare for surprises such as epidemics and natural
disasters, enabling us to react to them in beneficial ways.
Supported by a list of guiding questions and suggestions for class projects, this is
an accessible textbook for students of Future Studies and Future Studies courses.
Rick Szostak is Professor and Chair of Economics at the University of Alberta,
Canada. He is the author of 19 books and 50 articles across economic history, world
history, interdisciplinary studies, knowledge organization, and a dozen other fields.
This book is a sequel to his Making Sense of World History (2021).

MAKING SENSE OF
THE FUTURE
Rick Szostak
First published 2022
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2022 Rick Szostak
The right of Rick Szostak to be identified as author of this work has been
asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright,
Designs and Patents Act 1988.
The Open Access version of this book, available at www.taylorfrancis.com,
has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution- Non
Commercial- No Derivatives 4.0 license.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks,
and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing- in- Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data
A catalog record has been requested for this book
ISBN: 978- 1- 032- 03350- 1 (hbk)
ISBN: 978- 1- 032- 03348- 8 (pbk)
ISBN: 978- 1- 003- 18685- 4 (ebk)
DOI: 10.4324/ 9781003186854
Typeset in Bembo
by Newgen Publishing UK
The best way to predict the future is to create it
Commonly attributed to Peter Drucker

CONTENTS
List of figures ix
List of boxes x
Acknowledgements xii
1 Introduction 1
1.1 Outline of the book 3
1.2 Important characteristics of this book 5
1.3 A brief survey of Future Studies 8
1.4 Why do this? 10
2 Setting societal goals 11
2.1 How to set goals 11
2.2 Particular goals 14
2.3 Desirable futures 31
3 Plotting strategies to achieve societal goals 35
3.1 How to plot strategies 35
3.2 Strategies for achieving particular goals 39
3.3 Interactions among strategies 92
4 Predicting plausible futures 97
4.1 How to identify plausible futures 97
4.2 Particular trends 100
4.3 Plausible futures 127
viii Contents
5 Coping with surprises 130
5.1 How to identify surprises 132
5.2 Particular surprises 134
5.3 Interactions among surprises 151
6 Achieving desirable futures 154
6.1 Guidelines for advocacy 154
6.2 Gaining public support for strategies 155
6.3 Taking a staged approach 160
6.4 Networking 161
6.5 Leadership 162
6.6 Strategic planning 164
6.7 Engage in and encourage scenario planning 165
6.8 Dealing with entrenched interests 167
6.9 Act locally 169
6.10 Be prepared for failure 170
6.11 Believe in progress 171
6.12 Research that is needed 173
6.13 Integrating strategies for advocacy 176
7 Concluding remarks 178
Bibliographic reflections 180
Index 187
FIGURES
1.1 Plan of the book 4
2.1 Compatibility among societal goals 33
3.1 Placing strategies for better governance in context 57
4.1 A dystopian future 128
5.1 Interactions among surprises 151