Futurology

Ecology and the art of the possible

by Marco Cuevas-Hewitt

Forthcoming. Due for publication in mid-2012. Draft available for viewing.

First paragraph: "Evocative images, wispy like memory, light up the walls of a sunless room in an old colonial... more First paragraph: "Evocative images, wispy like memory, light up the walls of a sunless room in an old colonial era mental asylum turned art gallery. In their glow, an odd array of objects: Time-worn furniture, an antique French stereoscope, a bouquet of native flowers, jars of assorted bush tucker. Binding them are the invisible threads of stories, gathered up and re-woven by artists Tessa Zettel and Karl Khoe of the Sydney-based collective, Makeshift, during their two sojourns in Esperance in the autumn and spring of 2011. The black and white projection at the focal point of the installation conveys an eighteenth century dining scene, seemingly plucked out of Europe and parachuted into the dry salt lake where it was filmed, save for the bloodroot, wattleseed, and other edible native plants comprising the spread. Adding to its curiousness is the artists’ unusual choice to film it as a tableau vivant or ‘living picture’. This now-quaint convention, once popular as a form of entertainment at the soirees of aristocratic elites, involves the presentation of a scene by a silent and motionless cast of characters as if imitating a painting or photograph. The effect achieved by Makeshift is a film reel resembling a slideshow of images from the colonial frontier, eerily still but for the tablecloth flapping in the breeze..."

Scenario Planning and Futurology of the Persian Gulf Post-Oil Economy

by Mostafa Nejati

Vol. 13 Iss: 6, pp.18 - 33

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore the economy of Persian Gulf countries following a post-oil economy.... more Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore the economy of Persian Gulf countries following a post-oil economy. This is accompanied with a futurology study and planning of certain scenarios that can be applied to these countries.

Design/methodology/approach – This study applies a futurology approach by investigating various scenarios to explore the Arab economy after oil. As such, a series of possible policies are proposed that can be undertaken by Arab countries depending on their public policy. Each of the suggested policies involves different scenarios that have been formed and analyzed using an era-based cellular planning system.

Findings – The findings propose three main policies to be undertaken by Arab countries including: investing the oil income in miscellaneous economic baskets in order to minimize the vulnerability and maximize the profits; reducing the oil production in the coming years and transforming the one-product oil economy to a value added petrochemical economy; and seeking new sources of income and wealth. In addition, findings emphasize the necessity for using renewable and lasting wealth resources and minimizing the dependency of countries on the oil economy.

Originality/value – The proposed scenarios in the study can act as strategic constructs in strengthening the scenario sets in the consecutive years and help develop other scenarios in the future. As such, this paper would be of interest to governmental advisors, strategic planners and policy-makers involved in studies related to the Middle East.

Towards a Futurology of the Present: Notes on Writing, Movement, and Time

by Marco Cuevas-Hewitt

Published in the Journal of Aesthetics and Protest in December 2011. PDF came out weird (I'll replace it when I get time), so better to visit the link!

First paragraph: "Has there ever been a revolution without its musicians, artists, and writers? Could we imagine... more First paragraph: "Has there ever been a revolution without its musicians, artists, and writers? Could we imagine the Zapatista movement, for example, without its poetry and lyricism? At this moment, I am writing from the specific location of the west coast of Australia, on land known to Aboriginal Australians as Beeliar Boodjar. Across the Indian Ocean, remarkable things are happening in North Africa. I listen on the internet to the songs of freedom being sung in Tahrir Square, as well as to the young hip-hop artists who provided the soundtrack to the revolution in Tunisia. But their YouTube videos are not the only things going viral. Significantly, their mutant desires, of which their music is an expression, are also beginning to ripple outwards. I feel it here at my kitchen table as I type, as viscerally as the caffeine flowing through my body. I also see it on the evening news in Spain and Greece. Perhaps the alterglobalisation movement never died, but was simply laying in wait. Perhaps we are only at the beginning. And perhaps there is little real difference in our movements between making music and making change; between the creation of art and the creation of new social relations through our activisms. Our common art is the crafting of new ways of being, of seeing, of valuing; in short, the cultivation of new forms of life, despite and beyond the deadening, ossified structures all around us..."

For a Resilient City – Insights from a Civic Conversation in Glasgow

by Pete Seaman

Pete Seaman and Andrew Lyon

The Civic Conversation explores both the aspirations and the possibilities of living, and what is worth doing, to... more The Civic Conversation explores both the aspirations and the possibilities of living, and what is worth doing, to ensure that both Glasgow and Glaswegians flourish. The basic premise underlying this process is that the way a community talks to itself, how it forms its values, beliefs and policies ultimately influences how it behaves. It offers those with a stake in the future of the City an additional way to meet and discuss issues of strategic importance and how these might be effectively addressed. Some of these are based upon existing knowledge and concerns; others emerge through the conversation as it develops.

H. G. WELLS, ‘THE DISCOVERY OF THE FUTURE’ AND THE CANCELLED ROYAL INSTITUTION LECTURE

by John Partington

H. G. Wells Newsletter, 5. 14 (Summer 2007), pp. 13-16.