Sources of Futures Studies from Foresight to Anticipation

Quality of life and satisfaction with life as tightly interconnected concepts have become of much importance in the urbanism era. No doubt, it is one of the most important goals of every human society to enhance a citizen’s quality of life and to increase their satisfaction with life. However, there are many signs which demonstrate the low level of life satisfaction of Iranian citizens especially among the youth. Thus, considering the temporal concept of life satisfaction, this research aims to make a futures study in this field. Therefore, using a mixed model and employing research methods from futures studies, life satisfaction among the students of the University of Tehran were measured and their views on this subject investigated. Both quantitative and qualitative data were analysed together in order to test the hypotheses and to address the research questions on the youth discontentment with quality of life. Findings showed that the level of life satisfaction among students is relatively low and their image of the future is not positive and not optimistic. These views were elicited and discussed in the social, economic, political, environmental and technological perspectives. Keywords: futures studies, quality of life, satisfaction with life, youth

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The Futurists. Experts in World Futures

10.1093/oso/9780198814337.003.0009 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Jenny Andersson

Keyword(s):

Cold War ◽

Status Quo ◽

The Other ◽

Futures Studies ◽

The Future ◽

The Status ◽

The One ◽

The Cold War ◽

Images Of The Future ◽

The Way

Alvin Toffler’s writings encapsulated many of the tensions of futurism: the way that futurology and futures studies oscillated between forms of utopianism and technocracy with global ambitions, and between new forms of activism, on the one hand, and emerging forms of consultancy and paid advice on the other. Paradoxically, in their desire to create new images of the future capable of providing exits from the status quo of the Cold War world, futurists reinvented the technologies of prediction that they had initially rejected, and put them at the basis of a new activity of futures advice. Consultancy was central to the field of futures studies from its inception. For futurists, consultancy was a form of militancy—a potentially world altering expertise that could bypass politics and also escaped the boring halls of academia.

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Hope against hope: COVID-19 and the space for political imagination

European Journal of Cultural Studies ◽

10.1177/13675494211004594 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 136754942110045

Author(s):

Jonathan Gross

Keyword(s):

Cultural Studies ◽

Critical Pedagogy ◽

Political Imagination ◽

Futures Studies ◽

Political Struggle ◽

Discursive Space ◽

Devised Theatre ◽

Interdisciplinary Field ◽

The Future

COVID-19 has loosened neoliberalism’s hegemonic grip on the future. Amid the enormous suffering experienced internationally, there is much discussion of how to ‘Build Back Better’, and hope for a more caring, just and sustainable world. But competing futures are being imagined and planned. Hope is never politically neutral, and the content of collective hope is a key site of political struggle. This is partly a question of space: who has the literal and discursive space in which to develop visions of the future? The following article considers the role that cultural studies can play in this struggle. ‘Conjunctural analysis’ has a key task, making visible the competing futures contained within the present. But cultural studies should go further: combining conjunctural analysis with methods drawn from a range of scholarly and activist traditions – including critical pedagogy, devised theatre and the interdisciplinary field of futures studies – that deliberately create spaces for imagining new futures.

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A Systematic Literature Review on Sustainability in Family Firms

Sustainability ◽

10.3390/su13073824 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (7) ◽

pp. 3824

Author(s):

Carla Curado ◽

António Mota

Keyword(s):

Construction Industry ◽

Social Inclusion ◽

Family Firms ◽

Small And Medium Enterprises ◽

Futures Studies ◽

Sustainable Business ◽

Bottom Line ◽

Medium Enterprises ◽

Corporate Social ◽

Market Pressures

In this study, we explore the research published from 2015 to 2020 on the importance of family firms (FFs) to sustainability. Our results come from a content analysis of 28 studies on this topic. Further, they deal with small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in the construction industry in Italy and Spain. These studies mainly follow a quantitative approach with data from a survey. This study’s main contribution regards the identification of three sorts of aspects associated to sustainability in FFs which match the three pillars of the triple bottom line approach that supports sustainable business development: social inclusion, economic development, and environmental protection. Our findings show that the family’s religiosity, reputation, and image play relevant roles in the FFs’ adoption of sustainable practices. Moreover, the CEO and their successor’s choices also have consequences for sustainability. These studies demonstrate how the family’s control, its values, and the industry influence the adoption of corporate social responsibility (CSR) practices. FFs go green by adopting eco-innovation to adapt to the constantly changing environment and market pressures. We acknowledge the limitations of the study. We offer advice to colleagues when developing future futures studies to address the influence of cultural differences between FFs and non-FFs and suggest they perform comparative analyses. This research could lead to further investigation of the effects of other variables that may influence sustainability in the context of FFs.

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