dates

ART43.pdf

FTA and equity: New approaches to governance Cristiano Cagnin a,,*Denis Loveridge b, Ozcan Saritas b adg Joint research Centre Institute for Prospective Technological Studies, Calle Inca Garcilaso 3, 41092 Seville, Spain

Futures 43 (2011) 279 291 A r T I C L E I N F O Article history:

Available online 26 november 2010 A b s T R A c T FTA and equity addresses the need for multiple stakeholders'participation in public policy and corporate decision making thus leading to more democratic societies.

Ulrich Beck 2 coined the term‘the risk society'in 1986, but this was some time after the UK's Royal Society embarked, in 1981, on a series of conferences on the assessment and perception of risk.

Risk and perceptions of it are closely related to fear making the proper understanding of the real physical nature of risk of prime importance to framing regulations where the politics of fear may intrude irrationally.

It has been only since the middle of the Twentieth Century, that a long, slow running unease with the assumption that all science and technology were‘good things

Soddy 3, 4, in the 1920s, provided a particular form of scientific criticism of the conventional mantra.

By the early 1970s, the clamour for governance of S&t resulted in the formation of the PAU in the UK and the OTA in the USA;

New fora for involving the public in the governance of S&t came in many forms from the 1970s onwards,

All these procedures highlighted the breadth of the cascade of situations as they have evolved over the last 40 years.

/Futures 43 (2011) 279 291 280 both been disbanded under changing political regimes. Most recently, foresight studies have stormed onto the scene to become a global phenomenon.

Both of these fields have been evolving since the 1960s. Similarly, the continuing pressure for the public participation in science and technology decision-making processes, elsewhere called a‘democratic deficit'and coming from Greenpeace, the Friends of the Earth, the ETC Group,

/Futures 43 (2011) 279 291 281 As a counter-argument, Olsen 11 suggests that the process of governance may not always produce a precise and stable policy outcome.

/Futures 43 (2011) 279 291 282 To achieve this goal, a base of knowledge and abilities that are technically feasible

and Development in 1992 23 by representatives of 179 countries) and is at the heart of the quest for new forms of global governance. 5. Corporate industrial activity

/Futures 43 (2011) 279 291 283 CSR proponents have used four arguments to make their case 29:

/Futures 43 (2011) 279 291 284 CSR strategies may work under certain conditions 24, but they are highly vulnerable to market failures.

and the UN Global Compact Initiative (UNGCI) in the GRI G3 guidelines. 3 The UNGCI, launched by the United nations in 2000 in partnership with business,

since 1999 when the Dow jones Sustainability Indexes were created, closely followed by the FTSE4GOOD 24. Socially responsible investment is about investors taking ethical,

was calculated first worldwide in 1985 and FTSE was established as an independent company in 1995 http://www. ftse. com/about ftse/About ftse. jsp.

C. Cagnin et al.//Futures 43 (2011) 279 291 285 Corporate governance is then about strategic CSR,

which integrates value chain social impacts and investments in competitive context; it is developed the means by a firm to build a proper dialogue with stakeholders

The headline message from the 2006 World Economic Forum at Davos was that we are shifting from a world characterised increasingly by resource constraints to one which

/Futures 43 (2011) 279 291 286 beyond addressing global inequalities and cultural and religious divides.

Dignity, equity and peace together with globalisation, world trade, Africa and climate change were the highlights in the 2007 Annual Meeting.

On the same theme The World Economic Forum Annual Meeting 2008 opened with calls from the Co-Chairs to exercise‘‘The Power of Collaborative Innovation''to meet the top challenges of economic instability, climate change and equitable growth.

One may argue that citizens who are given the opportunity to be informed effectively; to understand and to have a say on new technological choices in appropriate settings,

/Futures 43 (2011) 279 291 287 business and society if consistently invested in social initiatives

The conventional economic mantra has persisted far beyond its‘sell by'date, a point made forcefully at least as early as 1972 in the publication of the‘‘Limits to Growth''38.

at least, the Second International Seville Conference on Future-oriented technology analysis (September 2006. The greater acknowledgement of the co-evolution of technology and society,

In the 2006 FTA Conference, the FTA COMMUNITY realised the need to address the imperative of improving the two-way linkage between knowledge and the building of a‘common world'.

/Futures 43 (2011) 279 291 288 community's readiness to address global issues and to building governance at a global level.

/Futures 43 (2011) 279 291 289 References 1 D. Large, Participation and representation, A Review of Sustainability Here and now, in part of The Great Debate:

Development Sustainability Environment, Newcastle Civic Centre on 27 september 2003 (available at: http://www. thegreatdebate. org. uk/GDDSEDL1. html, last visited on 03 october 2008.

2 B. Ulrich, Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity, Sage, London, 1992.3 F. Soddy, Cartesian Economics:

, L. Martel, The next 200 years, in: Associated Business Programs, 1976.6 H. Kahn, Thinking About the Unthinkable, Weidenfeld and Nicholson, 1962.7 H. Kahn, A. Weiner, The Year 2000:

A Framework for Speculation on The next Thirty-three Years, Macmillan, 1967.8 Lindblom, Politics Markets: The World's Political-Economic system, Basic books, 1977.9 Y. K. Sheng,

What is good governance? United nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (2008.

10 COM, European Governance: A White paper, Commission of the European communities, 2001.11 J. P. Olsen, Reforming European institutions of governance, Journal of Common market studies 40 (2002) 581 602.12 W. Ulrich, Critical systems

heuristics, in: H. G. Daellenbach, R. L. Flood (Eds. The Informed Student Guide to Management Science, Thomson Learning, London, 2002,,

p. 72.13 D. Loveridge, P. Street, Inclusive foresight, Foresight 7 (3)( 2005) 31 47.14 D. Loveridge, Foresight:

The Art and Science of Anticipating the Future, Routledge, New york, 2009.15 H. G. Daellenbach, Systems thinking & Decision making:

P042-T4), Athens, July 9 11 (Keynote paper), 2007.19 EC, Growing Regions, Growing Europe: Fourth Report on Economic and Social Cohesion, European communities, 2007.20 C. H. Cagnin, An information architecture to enable business sustainability.

while also doing good is that markets don't really work that way, Stanford Social Innovation Review (2005).

Readings and Cases in Corporate Morality, 4th ed.,Mcgraw-hill, New york, 1970.26 BSR, Corporate Social Responsibility, Business for Social Responsibility, 2003 http://www. bsr

. org/BSRSERVICES/CSR. cfm#ZURICH. 27 C. Shelton, Quantum leaps, Butterworth-Heinemann, 1997.28 NNSR, Novo Nordisk Sustainability Report, 2002 http://www

the link between competitive advantage and corporate social responsibility, Harvard Business Review (2006. 30 O. Salzmann, A. Ionescu-Somers, U. Steger, The business case for corporate sustainability:

literature review and research options, European Management Journal 23 (1)( 2005) 27 36.31 U. Steger, A. Ionescu-Somers, O. Salzmann, The economic foundations of corporate

sustainability, Corporate Governance 7 (2)( 2007) 162 177.32 L. E. Preston, D. P. O'Bannon, The corporate social-financial performance relationship:

a typology and analysis, Business and Society 36 (4)( 1997) 419 429.33 K. Davis, Can business afford to ignore social responsibilities?

California Management Review 2 (1960) 70 76.34 B. Gates, Making Capitalism More Creative, Time Inc.,2008 July 31.

/Futures 43 (2011) 279 291 290 35 M. E. Porter, M. R. Kramer, The competitive advantage of corporate philanthropy, Harvard Business Review (2002.

creating value, Harvard Business Review (1999. 37 S. A. Aaronson, J. Reeves, The European response to public demands for global corporate responsibility, National policy Association, USA (2002.

38 D. H. Meadows, D. L. Meadows, J. Randers, W. W. Behrens III, The Limits to Growth, a Report to The Club of Rome, Earth Island

, 1996,1999 & 1989 with J. B. Cobb. 40 H. Z. Evan, Seminar at Economic Commission of Europe, Warsaw, 1973.41 F. Davitaya, Changes in the Atmosphere and Some Problems of its Protection, in Society and the Environment:

)( 1989) 144 152.43 Cagnin, et al. Eds.),), Future-oriented technology analysis: Strategic intelligence for An Innovative economy, Springer, 2008. C. Cagnin et al./

/Futures 43 (2011) 279 291 291

ART44.pdf

The Big Picture trends, drivers, wild cards, discontinuities and weak signals Ozcan Saritas a,,*Jack E. Smith b a Manchester Institute of Innovation research, University of Manchester, Oxford Road, M13 9pl Manchester, UK b Federal Foresight & Innovation strategy, Defence

R&d Canada, 305 Rideau St.,8th Floor, CJ02 Ottawa, Ontario, Canada K1a 0k2 1. Introduction One of the recurring items of feedback from previous FTA Symposia

drivers of change and prospective discontinuities that might be expected within 5 10 or 15 years. The rationale for this concern tended to be expressed in these terms:‘‘

an opportunity to contribute to a value-adding Futures 43 (2011) 292 312 A r T I C L E I N F O Article history:

Available online 19 november 2010 A b s T R A c T Following work done in the UK, Canada and now starting across Europe,

what to expect between 2010 and 2025 as the character of the 21st century begins to become firmly established.

What are the shaping forces, or sources of change and what might be their impacts,

particularly where these may create entirely new challenges and opportunities? Futures experts (attendees of the FTA 2008 Conference) were invited to state their opinions on these questions by considering the trends, drivers, wilds cards,

discontinuities and weak signals likely to shape the future through the Big Picture Survey. The survey was launched 6 months prior to the Conference.

More than 250 responses were submitted by the Conference date. The results collected were synthesised and presented back to the attendees in a plenary presentation by the authors.

The current paper aims to clarify the concepts first by suggesting definitions and discussing the distinctions between them.

presents its methodology and discusses the results of the survey in a greater extent. 2010 Elsevier Ltd.

Global Futures Forum Vancouver April 2008, Europe@2025 European commission. Contents lists available at Sciencedirect Futures journal homepage:

The originators of this survey used the responses to lead a plenary discussion at the 2008 FTA Conference,

In its Science and Innovation Investment Framework 2004 2014, the UK Government committed to establishing a Centre of Excellence in Horizon scanning

at least insofar as they usually endure as influential shapers for at least 4 5 years until succeeded by others.

as well as persistent problems or trends''(http://horizonscanning. defra. gov. uk last visited on March 14, 2009.

O. Saritas, J. E. Smith/Futures 43 (2011) 292 312 293 Potential trends Possible new trends grow from innovations, projects,

just a few years ago, alternative medicine remained an outcast from modern medicine. Now it has links with big business

policies and business focus over periods of several years that usually have global reach. What is interesting about trends is that normally most players,

O. Saritas, J. E. Smith/Futures 43 (2011) 292 312 294 As one can see there are subtle differences from trends.

and forces that change from year to year and may be amenable to stakeholder actions and strategic choices by way of one's investments, new alignments, infrastructure, R&d,

The attacks of September 11, 2001, which created significant shocks to the global security, airport screening and intelligence systems and practices;

'Steinmueller 8 also has an excellent overview of wild cards in the 2008 RAHS Booklet on Foresight:

O. Saritas, J. E. Smith/Futures 43 (2011) 292 312 295 Building on Petersen's work, Barber 9 developed an additional wild cards

rapid progress of ICT and biotech End of Moore's Law 100 years life expectancy Environment:

An example from the 1960s is the introduction of the electronic calculator. In a very short time, slide rules and mechanical calculators disappeared and, in some cases,

O. Saritas, J. E. Smith/Futures 43 (2011) 292 312 296 Recent reports about accelerated arctic ice shelf melting and greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere

so for example, James Hanson's presentation to the US Congress in 1988 about possible global warming on the horizon,

or in technology terms, the speed of take up of‘‘Mosaic''(precursor to Netscape) as the first Internet browser in 1993,

and signs usually associated with early developments in technologies, societal innovations, conflicts, origins of conflicts, etc. that while not easily verifiable from a present day perspective.

but not confirmed changes that may later become more significant indicators of critical forces for development, threats, business and technical innovation.

Weak signal examples In the 1980s the first mention was made of global warming and climate change;

The collapse of the Berlin Wall and subsequently the Soviet union was weakly discernible in the mid 1980s through assessments of military capacities and responses to the‘‘Star wars''initiatives;

The growing importance of nanotechnology was first apparent as early as 1986 when Eric Drexler issued his first book on the subject. 4 http://www. metsafoorumi. fi/dokumentit/newsletter3 05. pdf. 5 http://hosting. fountainpark. com/strategysignals/.

/O. Saritas, J. E. Smith/Futures 43 (2011) 292 312 297 3. Big Picture Survey 3. 1. Motivation and approach Up until the Future-oriented technology analysis

(FTA) 2008 Conference, previous FTA meetings tended to focus on methodology, policy linkages and success factors for Foresight design & delivery.

The Scientific Committee of the FTA 2008 Conference heard that some attendees felt that an opportunity had been missed to discuss future Foresight determinants

1. Years of Foresight experience; 2. Country of residence; 3. Affiliation-type of organization represented. Then, the in the second part, the respondents were asked to identify a list of trends, drivers of change, wild cards/shocks, weak signals and discontinuities.

2008 2015; 2016 2025; beyond 2025.3.1.2. Data set Total surveys submitted: 293; substantive completion: 106 (about 50%of FTA Conference attendees;

Respondent Distribution Charts by: years of experience, country of residence and affiliation;(3) 15 STEEP Categories for each domain of interest:

i e. trends, drivers, shocks, discontinuities and weak signals=75 cells of content (Table 1; Qualitative review of Foresight (content) insights and patterns;

3. 1. 3. Further analysis Analysis of each of the Domains of Interest according to%distribution by years of experience, country of residence, affiliation;

J. E. Smith/Futures 43 (2011) 292 312 298 e g. do those with more years of experience tend to use greater differentiation in their scoring?

Results can serve as baseline for a more quantitative-reactive survey next year likely generating a higher return rate requiring less time to formulate original ideas. 3. 2. Analysis of the results 3. 2. 1. Descriptive statistics

The majority of respondents engaged in Foresight activity 5 10 years as expected a quite experienced group of professionals (Fig. 2). The survey respondents were mainly from Academia and Governmental bodies (Fig. 3). 3. 2. 2

O. Saritas, J. E. Smith/Futures 43 (2011) 292 312 299 The diagram illustrates that:

The respondents with more than 15 years of experience constituted the largest single group, comprising more than a quarter of the total of all respondents clear evidence of the substantial experience present at the FTA Conference.

O. Saritas, J. E. Smith/Futures 43 (2011) 292 312 300 Table 2 Examples of trends.

and need for management Aging/labor force ratio creating tensions Negative prospects from genetic manipulation‘‘Privacy loss''as 21st century externality Pandemic risks increase Genetically designed children will be possible Dematerialisation the West

and migration Strategic cyber intrusions attacks shut downs Water is the oil in the 21st century Disintegration of states,

O. Saritas, J. E. Smith/Futures 43 (2011) 292 312 301 years experienced groups. We believe that this strong contribution from the more experienced contributors supports the basic assumption behind the survey that such a gathering of experts would constitute a uniquely defined relevant cohort worthy of sampling

Furthermore, high impact assessment is more prevalent among the more highly experienced respondents(>10 years. Likelihood and time horizon assessment.

The time of occurrence for most of the trends was considered to be from 2016 to 2025.

Respondents believe that around 30%of the trends will occur in the short term (before 2015.

the survey respondents generally expect that the highest controversies are likely to emerge from 2016 to 2025.3.2.2.3.

The majority of the respondents from Australasia (60%)stated that the trends will occur in the short term (before 2015.

More than half of the respondents from North america and the EU countries suggested a medium time horizon (between 2016 and 2025) for the occurrence of the trends identified.

Whereas, the majority of respondents from Academia and NGOS (51%and 58%respectively) considered that the trends will occur between 2016 and 2025

whereas the majority of the respondents from business envisaged shorter time horizon for the emergence of trends (between 2008 and 2015.

O. Saritas, J. E. Smith/Futures 43 (2011) 292 312 302 Fig. 7 shows the frequency distribution of drivers of change and the most widely cited ones.

A balanced distribution is observed among the respondents with 1 3, 5 10 and over 15 years experience.

except the respondents with 10 15 years experience, who considered that about one third of drivers have low probability of occurrence.

All respondents from less than 1 year experience to more than 15 years considered that the majority of the drivers will occur between 2016 and 2025.3.2.3.2.

O. Saritas, J. E. Smith/Futures 43 (2011) 292 312 303 Impact assessment. There was a general consensus among all respondents around the globe that around 65%of the drivers will have high impact

The majority of respondents from the EU member and associate countries and North america considered that around half of the drivers will occur between 2016 and 2025.

J. E. Smith/Futures 43 (2011) 292 312 304 affiliations expect high likelihood of occurrence.

The majority of the all respondents (around 50%)consider that the drivers will emerge from 2016 to 2025.

O. Saritas, J. E. Smith/Futures 43 (2011) 292 312 305 include those identified in Table 4 that would have unknown implications because of they were to appear,

Again, to be able to embody there types of wild cards into some scenarios could be a provocative and rewarding exercise to test some of the leverage points that may impact change

As the years of experience increased, the time horizon for the occurrence of wild cards tended to remain between 2016 and 2025.

Respondents with no experience expected that the wild cards would occur after 2025, whereas the respondents with maximum 3 years of experience had a shorter time horizon (2008 2015).

Affiliation time horizon. Regarding the affiliation of participants, the time of occurrence for wild cards indicates parallelism between the respondents from Academia, Business and Other affiliations,

redistribution of wealth to enable the achievement of millennium development goals New Islamic superpower Rapid climate change overwhelms human capacity Massive failure of capitalism

O. Saritas, J. E. Smith/Futures 43 (2011) 292 312 306 3. 2. 5. Discontinuities The orientations of discontinuities are represented with the following radar diagram

years of experience and country of origin) demonstrates particular significance with respect to the differentiation and sophistication of responses.()

O. Saritas, J. E. Smith/Futures 43 (2011) 292 312 307 3. 2. 5. 1. Joint assessment of Foresight experience and discontinuities.

Over 33%of the discontinuities were defined by the respondents with over 15 years experience. Respondents with 5 10 years experience also contributed significantly (over 27%.

%Impact assessment. The majority of the drivers identified were identified as likely to have high impact on the STEEP systems with the rest of the drivers (approximately a quarter of them) likely to have medium impact.

Different from the other groups, respondents with 5 15 years experience considered that more than 50%of the discontinuities will occur with the realisation time between 2016 and 2025.

Inexperienced respondents(<1 year) considered that most of the discontinuities will be observed in the short run (before 2015

whereas the most experienced respondents expect that the discontinuities will occur in the medium run (2016 2025.

On the other hand 67%of the respondents from Australasia considered the likelihood of occurrence medium. 45%of North american respondents expect that the discontinuities will occur after 2025,

whereas most of the EU member country respondents suggest that the discontinuities will emerge between 2016 and 2025.

and deniers create discontinuity Global security issues rise, e g. nuclear crisis O. Saritas, J. E. Smith/Futures 43 (2011) 292 312 308 2016

to 2025. These differences suggest some further survey or focus group opportunities to probe the differences in perception of discontinuities. 3. 2. 5. 3. Joint assessment of Foresight affiliation and discontinuities.

This time Academia and Business suggested that most of the discontinuities would emerge from 2016 to 2025

whereas students and Governmental respondents expected a longer time horizon (beyond 2025. 3. 2. 6. Weak signals The radar diagram below (Fig. 12) shows the orientations of the 171 weak signals identified by the respondents of the Big Picture Survey.

O. Saritas, J. E. Smith/Futures 43 (2011) 292 312 309 Good response with 171 weak signals;

The respondents with a Foresight experience longer than 1 year expect most the majority of the weak signals to emerge in the medium term future (2016 2025),

whereas the inexperienced respondents have a longer time horizon (beyond 2025). This is likely due to the familiarity that older

The majority of the Business respondents have a longer term time horizon (beyond 2025) compared to the respondents from Academia

and Governments who consider that most of the weak signals will occur in the mid-term (2016 2025).

J. E. Smith/Futures 43 (2011) 292 312 310 4. Conclusions and implications on policy and strategy The following implications from the outputs of the Big Picture Survey

Another paper dedicated to a further elaboration of the BPS results is planned by the authors in 2009.

So wait for the next iteration in 2010. In summary, the authors are excited by how this information might be dissected further

Our primary conclusion is that it will be very useful to repeat the survey with FTA 2010 if possible,

and extend it to other similar groups, in the next year or two, for comparison purposes.

identifying common strategic choices and questions for knowledge, Science and Public policy 37 (1)( 2010) 7 18.2 S. Rijkers-Defrasne, E. Amanatidou, A. Braun, A. Pechmann,

the EFMN issue analysis, Foresight 10 (2008) 6, 90 102.3 DCDC, The DCDC Global Strategic Trends Programme:

2007 2036, third edition, Swindon, 2007. Available at: http://www. mod. uk/NR/rdonlyres/94a1f45ea883049db-B319-DF68C28D561D/0/strat trends 17mar07. pdf (last visited on:

January 30, 2009. 4 N. Damrongchai, P. Satangput, G. Tegart, C. Sripaipan, Future technology analysis for biosecurity and emerging infectious diseases in Asia-pacific, Science and Public policy 37 (1)( 2010

) 41 50.5 Wikipedia, Futurology, 2009. Available at: http://en. wikipedia. org/wiki/Futurology#Weak signals. 2c the future sign and wild cards (last visited on:

March 14, 2009. 6 J. Smith, Presentation at the Centre for Innovation studies, Thecis Breakfast Edmonton Alberta, January 13th, 2009.7 J. Petersen, Out of the blue How to Anticipate Big Future Surprises, Madison Books, 2000.8

K. Steinmueller, Thinking about The Future-Strategic Anticipation and RAHS by Risk assessment and Horizon scanning (RAHS), National Security Coordination Secretariat, Singapore, 2008.9 M. P. Barber,

Wildcards signals from a future near you, Journal of Future Studies 11 (2006) 1. 10 N. N. Taleb, The Black swan:

The Impact of the Highly Improbable, Random House Publishing, New york, 2007.11 P. van Notten, A m. Sleegersb, M. van Asselt, The future shocks:

On discontinuity and scenario development, Technological forecasting & Social Change 72 (2005) 2, 175 194.12 S. Mendonc¸A m. P. Cunha, F. Ruff, J. Kaivo-oja

preparing for wild cards in the civil aircraft and asset-management industries, Long Range Planning 42 (1)( 2009) 23 41.

O. Saritas, J. E. Smith/Futures 43 (2011) 292 312 311 13 K. Steinmueller, Wild cards for Europe, Z punkt, 2003.

March 14, 2009. 14 R c. Jantz, Technological Discontinuities in the Library: Digital Projects that Illustrate New Opportunities for the Librarian and the Library, in:

66th IFLA Council and General Conference, Jerusalem, Israel, 13 18 august 2000. Available at: http://www. ifla. org/IV/ifla66/papers/006-120e. htm (last visited on:

March 14, 2009. 15 Social Technologies, Discontinuity: Mobility, 2008. Available at: http://www. socialtechnologies. com/Fileview. aspx?

filename=PR DISCONTINUITIES MOBILITTYV2%20ks%20mh%20eds final. pdf (last visited on: March 14, 2009. 16 E. Hiltunen, Weak signals, Presentation given at the Finland futures research centre, 2007.

Available at: http://www. slideshare. net/whatidiscover/weaksiggnal (last visited on: March 14, 2009. 17 Y. Nugroho, O. Saritas, Incorporating network perspectives in Foresight:

a methodological proposal, Foresight 11 (2009) 6, 21 41. O. Saritas, J. E. Smith/Futures 43 (2011) 292 312 312

ART45.pdf

The influence of future-oriented technology analysis: Addressing the Cassandra challenge§Ron Johnston a,,*Cristiano Cagnin b a Australian Centre for Innovation, Australia b European commission, DG Joint research Centre, Institute for Prospective Technological Studies, Spain‘‘Cassandra was a daughter of Hecuba

and King Priam, the rulers of Troy during the Trojan war according to Homer's Illiad. Cassandra was a beautiful young woman, blessed with the gift of prophecy by Apollo,

who was infatuated with her. Unfortunately, she shunned Apollo at the last minute and he added a twist to her gift:

The setting for the interviews was the Future-oriented technology analysis International Conference organised by the EU Joint research Centre Institute for Prospective Technology studies (IPTS) in Seville in October 2008.

Another pointed to the historical limitations of any attempt to Futures 43 (2011) 313 316 A r T I C L E I N F O Article history:

Available online 19 november 2010 A b s T R A c T This paper is based on a series of interviews with nine leading researchers conducted during the Future-oriented technology analysis International Conference held in Seville

on 16 17 october 2008. Analysis of these interviews paints a picture of FTA as an increasingly important approach being adopted in many countries to address the many challenges which are emerging at this time in human history.

as with Cassandra's prophecies. 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.§§This paper is based on interviews with nine leading FTA researchers conducted during the Future-oriented technology analysis International Conference held in Seville on October 16 17,2008.

The interviewees were selected on the basis of their long experience with FTA, and the variety of their experience and perspectives.

Faculty of engineering, University of Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia. Tel.:++61 02 9351 3934; fax:++61 02 9351 3974.

''In this context, there is wide agreement that the two years since the 2006 International Seville FTA Conference had seen significant development in FTA capacity across many countries and regions:‘‘

‘‘We have moved from the spectacular mountains of individual foresight studies to the range of foothills of distributed and embedded foresight projects, less visible but probably far greater in volume''.

and evaluating the impact of fta has emerged as a major preoccupation for the field in recent years, with the recognition that demonstrating impact is probably the greatest hurdle to the wider acceptance and use of FTA.

A paper by Calof and Smith at the 2008 International Seville FTA Conference 3 concludes‘‘methodology,

R. Johnston, C. Cagnin/Futures 43 (2011) 313 316 314 The first FTA Conference in 2004 gathered predominantly the EU-US community together to take stock of the developments

and a special issue of Technological forecasting and Social Change 5. The second Conference in 2006 enlarged the geographical base of participants,

and Technology analysis & Strategic management 8. The large number of papers submitted in 2008 is an indication both of the central role the FTA Conference has come to play, principally for European researchers but also increasingly for researchers from around the world,

The focus of two sessions of the 2008 FTA Conference on security and sustainability may be a useful first move in this direction.

and in all components of public and private decision-making. 4. Conclusions The interviews conducted as a component of the Future-oriented technology analysis International Conference held in Seville on 16 17 october 2008 provide a clear insight into the current state of the FTA

and may well resort to other guides to the future, or apply them (as we have seen with scenario planning) with little comprehension of their essential components.

and in supporting the linkage between the analysis of the interviews with the overall results of the 2008 FTA Conference.

R. Johnston, C. Cagnin/Futures 43 (2011) 313 316 315 Ricardo Seidl da Fonseca UNIDO, Austria.

Cursed Prophetess, 1998, accessed at http://www. arthistory. sbc. edu/imageswomen/papers/fittoncassandra/intro. html. 2 For example V. van Rij, Joint horizon scanning:

Future-oriented technology analysis International Conference, Seville, October, 2008, accessible at: http://forera. jrc. ec. europa. eu/fta 2008/prog day1. html. 4 F. Scapolo, E. Cahill, New horizons and challenges for future-oriented technology analysis, in:

New technology Foresight, Forecasting & Assessment Methods, 2004, European communities Technical Report EUR 21473 EN. 5 F. Scapolo, New horizons and challenges for future-oriented technology analysis:

The 2004 EU-US Seminar, Technological forecasting and Social Change 72 (9)( 2005. 6 Cagnin, et al.

impact on policy and decision making The 2006 FTA INTERNATIONAL SEVILLE SEMINAR, Technological forecasting and Social Change 75 (4)( 2008.

8 J. C. Harper, K. Cuhls, L. Georghiou, R. Johnston, Future-oriented technology analysis as a driver of strategy and policy, Technology analysis & Strategic management 20 (3)( 2008.

9 2008 FTA Conclusions written by the Conference's Scientific Committee available at: http://forera. jrc. ec. europa. eu/fta 2008/conclusions. html. 10 UK Foresight programme, Flood and Coastal Defence, 2004, http://www. foresight. gov

. uk/Ourwork/Completedprojects/Flood/index. asp. 11 UK Foresight programme, Tackling Obesities: Future Choices, 2007, http://www. foresight. gov. uk/Ourwork/Activeprojects/Obesity/Obesity. asp.

R. Johnston, C. Cagnin/Futures 43 (2011) 313 316 316

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