Hunt, Dexter and Lombardi, D. Rachel and Atkinson, Stuart and Barber, Austin R. G. and Barnes, Matthew and Boyko, Christopher and Brown, Julie and Bryson, John and Butler, David and Caputo, Silvio and Caserio, Maria and Coles, Richard and Cooper, Rachel and Farmani, Raziyeh and Gaterell, Mark and Hale, James and Hales, A. Chantal and Hewitt, C. N. and Jankovic, Lubo and Jefferson, Ian and Leach, J. and Mackenzie, Rob and Memon, Fayyaz A. and Sadler, Jon P. and Weingaertner, Carina and Whyatt, Duncan and Rogers, Christopher D.F. (2012) Scenario archetypes:converging rather than diverging themes. Sustainability, 4 (4). pp. 740-772.
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Abstract
Future scenarios provide challenging, plausible and relevant stories about how the future could unfold. Urban Futures (UF) research has identified a substantial set (>450) of seemingly disparate scenarios published over the period 1997–2011 and within this research, a sub-set of >160 scenarios has been identified (and categorized) based on their narratives according to the structure first proposed by the Global Scenario Group (GSG) in 1997; three world types (Business as Usual, Barbarization, and Great Transitions) and six scenarios, two for each world type (Policy Reform—PR, Market Forces—MF, Breakdown—B, Fortress World—FW, Eco-Communalism—EC and New Sustainability Paradigm—NSP). It is suggested that four of these scenario archetypes (MF, PR, NSP and FW) are sufficiently distinct to facilitate active stakeholder engagement in futures thinking. Moreover they are accompanied by a well-established, internally consistent set of narratives that provide a deeper understanding of the key fundamental drivers (e.g., STEEP—Social, Technological, Economic, Environmental and Political) that could bring about realistic world changes through a push or a pull effect. This is testament to the original concept of the GSG scenarios and their development and refinement over a 16 year period.