114 Chapter 4 The majority of the participants identified strategic planning as the core type of policy action to be taken in the present. Some of these assertions follow the logic of the narrative associated with Approach 1, namely that a future can be made partially knowable based on analytically informed insights, often generated through simulation modeling, in order to recommend policy action that reduces risks associated with a most likely future. It was said that numbers give guidance, and many policy makers seem to appreciate future visions in terms of likelihood and quantifications. Many pursue policy action in an Approach 1 mode, but based on futures that relate to the other three approaches. For example, a project might focus on imagining plural futures, but use them in order to provide recommendations and critiques to support the prioritization of policy measures. In such a case, the plurality of worldviews is regarded pivotal to the anticipatory process, but not necessarily seen to be maintained when formulating implications for the present. Another key form of policy action in the present that participants identified was associated with Approach 2: building capacities of decision-makers (as a broad category, including societal organizations such as farmer organizations). Such capacities are seen to be built through, amongst others, the provision of anticipatory tools to better understand and prepare for future changes. Most frequently, participants argued that a mix of Approach 1 and 2 is key – for instance, informing strategic planning in ways that also enhances the capacities for preparedness (for instance, in A common Journey). The present action associated with approach 3: mobilizing stakeholders to co-create new transformative futures, was mentioned much less often. It was mentioned only by 4 participants, which contrasts starkly with the relative importance of the other two-component elements of Approach 3 (plural futures and co-creating new futures). The Senses project explicitly identified the mobilization of a diverse group of stakeholders as the implication for policy action in the present, but saw this as part of building their anticipatory capacities for preparedness. The ResULTS and Senses projects also saw mobilizing stakeholders toward new futures as part of strategic planning and interrogating assumptions (merging approaches 1 and 4, Sentinel and ResULTS). The Food, Agriculture, Biodiversity, Land-Use, and Energy (FABLE), combines approaches 1, 3 and 4 in their experimentation with using algorithmic support to identify a country’s potential for making steps towards reaching the sustainable development goals and encourage policy makers to be more ambitious. Others used language that can be loosely associated with Approach 3 but here used in service of approaches 1 and 2, e.g., democratic stakeholder deliberation to yield a more strategic policy trajectory and building of anticipatory capacities (e.g. Agrimonde-Terra and Farmers of the Future).
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