Differences

This shows you the differences between two versions of the page.

--- future_fabulators:scenario_methods [2014-02-26 05:35] – maja
+++ future_fabulators:scenario_methods [2014-02-26 06:04] – maja
@@ Line 29: / Line 29: @@
   - Generating techniques: generation of ideas and collection of data (surveys, Delphi, workshops)
   - Integrating techniques: combining parts into wholes (time-series analysis, explanatory modelling, optimised modelling)
-  - Consistency techniques: checking the consistency of scenarios (cross impact analysis, morphological field analysis)</blockquote>
+  - Consistency techniques: checking the consistency of scenarios (cross impact analysis, morphological field analysis)
+</blockquote>
 <blockquote>Curry, Andrew and Wendy Schultz (2009), [[http://www.jfs.tku.edu.tw/13-4/AE03.pdf|Roads Less Travelled]] in the Journal of Futures Studies, Vol. 13(4) made a comparison between different scenario methods: "Using four different scenario building methods: the 2x2 matrix approach; causal layered analysis; the Manoa approach; and the scenario archetypes approach. (...) This exploratory comparison confirmed that different scenario generation methods yield not only different narratives and insights, but qualitatively different participant experiences. (...) There is little in the literature which attempts to evaluate the different types of futures insight which emerge when different scenarios methods are used, the way in which choice of method might influence the types of conversations which are enabled by different scenarios processes, or the benefits and risks in using one approach over another. (...) To some extent, any scenario method can be completed as a desk-top research exercise. But creating scenario processes that effectively create change means creating participatory processes: scenarios create new behaviour only insofar as they create new patterns of thinking across a significant population within an organisation. So how engaging is each method, and what kind of thinking, conversation, and energy does each method produce in participants?
-Each of these scenario methods appears to have distinguishing strengths. The 2x2 matrix approach produces four scenarios consistently focused on alternative outcomes for an issue at a specific scale. CLA generates conversations that dig down into the worldviews, mental models and cultural structures that inform how we perceive both issues and possible future outcomes. Manoa creates a diverse array of details across all levels of a possible future. Scenario archetypes guarantee consideration of outcomes across a specified set of worldviews. Yet none by itself is really a 'perfect', all-purpose approach. These differences underline the need for people who commission futures work to understand clearly what they are trying to achieve through scenario building, and to remain open to the methods that are most likely to be effective in reaching the desired outcome. (...) The primary lesson we have learned from this exercise as active practitioners is the value of mash-ups: combining and layering different techniques to enrich outcomes. " </blockquote>
+Each of these scenario methods appears to have distinguishing strengths. The 2x2 matrix approach produces four scenarios consistently focused on alternative outcomes for an issue at a specific scale. CLA generates conversations that dig down into the worldviews, mental models and cultural structures that inform how we perceive both issues and possible future outcomes. Manoa creates a diverse array of details across all levels of a possible future. Scenario archetypes guarantee consideration of outcomes across a specified set of worldviews. Yet none by itself is really a 'perfect', all-purpose approach. These differences underline the need for people who commission futures work to understand clearly what they are trying to achieve through scenario building, and to remain open to the methods that are most likely to be effective in reaching the desired outcome. (...) The primary lesson we have learned from this exercise as active practitioners is the value of mash-ups: combining and layering different techniques to enrich outcomes." </blockquote>
@@ Line 70: / Line 72: @@
 <html><a href="https://www.emeraldinsight.com/content_images/fig/2730110302004.png"><img src="https://www.emeraldinsight.com/content_images/fig/2730110302004.png" width="400"></a></html> <html><a href="http://www.mepss.nl/tools/w07-fig1.gif"><img src="http://www.mepss.nl/tools/w07-fig1.gif"></a></html>
-==== Four Generic Futures ====
+=== Four Generic Futures ===
-<blockquote> Our use of "alternative futures" (or "scenarios") is usually within the context of helping an organization or community plan for and move towards its preferred future. (...) I have chosen to explain our use of alternative futures as though I were telling an interested community or organization what the components of a futures visioning process are in our understanding and experience, and how to conduct the various parts of an overall futures visioning process.
+<blockquote> Our use of "alternative futures" (or "scenarios") is usually within the context of helping an organization or community plan for and move towards its preferred future. (...) I have chosen to explain our use of alternative futures as though I were telling an interested community or organization what the components of a futures visioning process are in our understanding and experience, and how to conduct the various parts of an overall futures visioning process.</blockquote>
 James Dator in [[http://www.jfs.tku.edu.tw/14-2/A01.pdf|Alternative Futures at the Manoa School]]
+Dator discusses in length the process of creating four generic futures (Continue, Collapse, Discipline and Transform) - as four types of stories in which all/most future scenarios can be classified.
+<blockquote>
+) Continue: What are the ways in which the system in which we find ourselves could continue as it is?
+) Collapse: What are the ways in which it could fall apart?
+) Discipline: What are the ways in which it could be directed?
+) Transform: What are the ways in which it could change altogether?
+Phrased this way, each generic image of the future presents a challenge to test the boundaries of one’s expectations and understanding of the system.
+</blockquote>
+From Stuart Candy in his disertation [[http://www.scribd.com/doc/68901075/Candy-2010-The-Futures-of-Everyday-Life#|The Futures of Everyday Life]]
 === Cone of Plausibility ===
@@ Line 102: / Line 116: @@
-Anna Maria Orru and David Relan wrote [[:/resilients/scenario_symphony|The Scenario Symphony]] for the Resilients project, containing a whole range of scenario creation methods and techniques, including the dynamic [[:/resilients/from_pan_to_panarchy|panarchy]] and [[:/resilients/temporal model]].
+Anna Maria Orru and David Relan wrote [[:/resilients/scenario_symphony|The Scenario Symphony]] for the Resilients project, containing a whole range of scenario creation methods and techniques, including the dynamic [[:/resilients/from_pan_to_panarchy|panarchy]] and [[:/resilients/temporal model]]. It's interesting to compare it to the "Four Generic Futures" method above.
 <html><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/foam/8480321093/" title="figure5 by _foam, on Flickr"><img src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8505/8480321093_4d0379e220_c.jpg" width="800" height="354" alt="figure5"></a></html>
@@ Line 261: / Line 275: @@
 Backcasting starts with defining a desirable future and then works backwards to identify policies and programs that will connect the future to the present.
-However with retrocasting/retrotesting or scenario testing (as we also call it sometimes) we don't look at exclusively at a desirable future, but at different possible futures resulting from scenario building, and attempt to identify signals in the present that might point to the future moving in this or that direction.
+However with retrocasting/retrotesting or scenario testing (as we also call it sometimes) we don't look at exclusively at a desirable future, but at different possible futures resulting from scenario building, and attempt to identify signals in the present that might point to the future moving in this or that direction. This is perhaps similar to the work of Dator, Schulz and others related to the "four generic futures" (see above in scenario examples), known as deductive forecasting or [[http://www.infinitefutures.com/tools/inclassic.shtml|incasting]].