International Futures Forum

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In 2001, the Scottish Council Foundation (SCF), a New Labour-esque think-based in Edinburgh, undertook an interesting move by founding a new organisation they called the International Futures Forum (IFF). Its purpose was ‘to bring international thinking to bear on our [the SCF's]work’, with a ‘generous grant’ from British Petrol. Today, the IFF is independent from the SCF and tries to bring together so-called ‘deep thinkers’ in order to ‘examine[s] deep structures in the modern global system in its search for a second enlight-enment' . Still supported by BP it ‘explore[s] new ways of operating effectively and responsibly in a world of boundless complexity, a world we no longer fully understand and cannot control’ . This world is seen as a challenge for business, government and society and confronts them with the task of ‘restor[ing] the capacity to act effectively and responsibly and thereby revive and foster a culture of human aspiration’. Based on this view of today’s world, the IFF seeks to create a new ‘paradigm’ by renouncing ‘traditional’ ways of making sense of the world. How does the IFF view its role in the spread of the Second Enlightenment? A diagram in one its first reports shows a “dialogue� between a variety of actors and the IFF’s place in it. The IFF wants to provide the ‘core dialogue thinkers’ who disseminate knowledge, specialist information and support to a ‘tier of converters’. These ‘convert the insights from the dialogue into practical form and [.] disseminate it to a wider audience’. This group is composed of a broad variety of organisations and actors, such as the Department for Trade and Industry (DTI), business corporations, artists and writers, the BBC, unspecified ‘social entrepreneurs’, policy makers, the OECD and also BP. Finally, a further group of agents, who will ‘make things happen on the ground’, should use the information provided through the dialogue. The IFF sees its role almost in a Hayekian tradition of ‘original thinkers’ who inform policy entrepreneurs or ‘second hand dealers in ideas’ – i.e. think-tanks – with their theoretical and rather abstract knowledge so that they can utilise it to influence the wider society and policy-makers. Not surprisingly, the IFF makes ‘no apology for taking seriously Margaret Mead’s conviction that a small group of individuals can change the world’ . This small group convening for the IFF’s first meeting in April 2001 included among others former Director of the OECD International Futures Programme and ‘futurist’ Wolfgang Michalski; Kees van der Hei-jden (director of the scenario and strategy consultancy Global Business Network, Emeritus Professor of General and Strategic Management at Strathclyde University, former head of the Business Environment Division in Group Planning at Royal Dutch/Shell, London), Arun Mairo from Boston Consulting Group India, Biologist Brian Goodwin, Pat Kane from the Sun-day Herald, and Mark Woodhouse, a philosopher interested in ‘scientific, spiritual, and healing communities’ . Rather than being a permanent think-tank, the IFF is an attempt to facilitate an international network of thinkers, businesspeople and policy makers. Its reports are written in airy, pseudo-postmodernist language, renounce almost all empirical research and define and approach policy problems from their own individual per-spectives. During a case study trip to BP’s Grangemouth refinery – the IFF group also conducted case studies on the ‘learning society in Dundee’ and on health provision for ‘deprived individuals and communities in Fife’ – the IFF came up with a ‘vision’ for the future of BP and Falkirk/Grangemouth. When BP asked the IFF how it could combine the challenge of adjusting the plant to global competition bearing on mind the responsibility of BP to all local stakeholders , the IFF proposed to under-stand the downsizing of the plant, which culminated in the lay off of about 1000 employees in 2001, as a creative act. As BP is a ‘different kind of energy company, radiating energy of all kinds – intellectual, physical, crea-tive – into the community’, the sacking of workers equals ‘releasing high quality resources into the community’ . This rather interesting take on unemployment and economical restructuring is part of the IFF’s attempt to act as a kind of “spiritual management consultancy�. However, behind these superficially laughable analyses and proposals, behind the language of challenge and creativity, we find policy statements with stark conse-quences if put into practice. If, for example, the IFF’s stance on the NHS-generated ‘entitlement culture’ was transformed into a ‘gift culture’ , the idea of a consensual welfare state based on civic rights and the idea of social justice would be even more transformed than the current New La-bour discourse on rights and responsibilities already has achieved. The allocation of health treatment as a gift would mean the final turn towards a charity-based system for the deserving poor ccording to its website: 'The International Futures Forum exists to develop the capacity to sustain human aspiration, realised through wise action, in a complex and challenging world.


We work in areas where there are no easy answers, where existing models fail to make sense of our confusing reality, where we are in over our heads, where we face an unacknowledged ‘conceptual emergency’.
We have developed a body of theory, practice and wide experience in taking on seemingly intractable challenges and developing the capacities in individuals, teams, organisations and communities to flourish in today’s powerful times.'

Funding

According to the IFF website: 'We now enjoy a variety of productive and mutually beneficial relationships with sponsors, clients, subscribers, research funders and others.


We are grateful to the following organisations for their core support

These are some of the organisations we have worked with:

Our subscribers include:

We have enjoyed research funding from:


Activities

As Hartwig Pautz has written:

With support from BP it ‘explore[s] new ways of operating effectively and responsibly in a world of boundless complexity, a world we no longer fully understand and cannot control’[1] (Accessed 17 February 2005). This world is seen as a challenge for business, government and society and confronts them with the task of ‘restor[ing] the capacity to act effectively and responsibly and thereby revive and foster a culture of human aspiration’. Based on this view of today’s world, the IFF seeks to create a new ‘paradigm’ by renouncing ‘traditional’ ways of making sense of the world.
How does the IFF view its role in the spread of the Second Enlightenment? A diagram in one its first reports shows a "dialogue" between a variety of actors ([2] Accessed 17 February 2005). ‘Core dialogue thinkers’ disseminate knowledge, specialist information and support to a ‘tier of converters’, who ‘convert the insights from the dialogue into practical form and who disseminate it to a wider audience’. This group is composed of a broad variety of organisations and actors, such as the Department for Trade and Industry (DTI), business corporations, artists and writers, the BBC, unspecified ‘social entrepreneurs’, policy makers, the OECD and also BP.
Finally, a further group of agents, who will ‘make things happen on the ground’, should use the information provided through the dialogue. In spite of the emphasis on ‘dialogue’, the IFF appears to see its role almost in a Hayekian tradition of ‘original thinkers’ who inform policy entrepreneurs or ‘second hand dealers in ideas’(Friedrich A.Hayek; Edwin J.Feulner and John Blundell. The Intellectuals and Socialism. London : Institute of Economic Affairs, 1998) with their theoretical and rather abstract knowledge so that they can utilise it to influence the wider society, including policy-makers. And, in fact, the IFF makes ‘no apology for taking seriously Margaret Mead’s conviction that a small group of individuals can change the world’('Project Prospectus' December 2000, p. 5. [3] (Accessed 2 March 2005). This small group convening for the IFF’s first meeting in April 2001 included among others former Director of the OECD International Futures Programme and ‘futurist’ Wolfgang Michalski; Kees van der Heijden (director of the scenario and strategy consultancy Global Business Network, Emeritus Professor of General and Strategic Management at Strathclyde University, former head of the Business Environment Division in Group Planning at Royal Dutch/Shell, London), Arun Mairo from Boston Consulting Group India, Biologist Brian Goodwin, Pat Kane from the Sunday Herald, and Mark Woodhouse, a philosopher interested in ‘scientific, spiritual, and healing communities’[4].
Rather than being a permanent think-tank, the IFF is an attempt to facilitate an international network of thinkers, businesspeople and policy makers. During a case study trip to BP’s Grangemouth refinery – the IFF group also conducted case studies on the ‘learning society in Dundee’ ('IFF Learning in Dundee. A Second Enlightenment View' [5] Accessed 4 March 2005) and on health provision for ‘deprived individuals and communities in Fife’ (IFF Entreprise in Falkirk [6] Accessed 4 March 2005) – the IFF came up with a "vision" for the future of BP and Falkirk/Grangemouth.
When BP asked the IFF how it could combine the challenge of adjusting the plant to global competition bearing on mind the responsibility of BP to all local stakeholders ('Health in Fife' [7], p. 2 Accessed 4 March 2005). The IFF responded by proposing to understand the downsizing of the plant, which culminated in the lay off of about 1000 employees, as a creative act. As BP is a ‘different kind of energy company, radiating energy of all kinds – intellectual, physical, creative – into the community’, the sacking of workers equals ‘releasing high quality resources into the community’ ('Health in Fife' [8], p. 3 Accessed 4 March 2005). This rather interesting take on unemployment and economic restructuring is part of the IFF’s attempt to create new management and organisational approaches. It wants to act as a kind of "spiritual management consultancy" – although behind the airy language of challenges and creativity we find statements with stark consequences if put into practice: for example, the IFF’s stance on the NHS generated ‘entitlement culture’ which should be transformed into a more creative ‘gift culture’, would lead to significant changes in the allocation of resources, as gift cultures rely on their reciprocity rather than on solidarity and social contracts [9](p, 19,Accessed 4 March 2005). (Source: www.psa.ac.uk/2005/pps/Pautz.pdf)

Contact

International Futures Forum PO Box 29207 St Andrews Fife KY16 8YU UK T: +44 1334470090 E: editorial@internationalfuturesforum.com

External Links

International Futures Forum website [10]

External links

Hartwig Pautz 'Think-Tanks in Scotland' Paper for the 55th Political Studies Association Annual conference, 4-7 April 2005, University of Leeds, www.psa.ac.uk/2005/pps/Pautz.pdf

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