Scholarship in futures studies and foresight has increasingly addressed environmental factors as drivers of socioecological change and related implications for the well-being of future generations. Faced with the accelerating climatic and biodiversity crisis, a mere descriptive analysis and monitoring effort of past and present ecological decline appears insufficient to maintain the livelihood of humans and non-humans in the Anthropocene. From environmental assessment research and related strategic planning efforts, a variety of anticipatory methods have emerged to create, analyze and enact alternative images of human-nature relationships of the future. Initiated in the geo-, eco- and environmental/sustainability sciences as predominantly natural scientific research communities, this epistemic, methodical and also sociocultural diversification of environmental futures research has more recently entered new fields, like the human and social sciences as in the environmental humanities, science and technology studies (STS) or futures studies, and the arts and creative fields as in art- and design-based research or art-as-research practices. Between these fields and disciplines, new inter- and transdisciplinary ways of conceiving, creating and applying images of environmental futures have been emerging, transcending disciplinary boundaries and blending academic and non-academic ways of theoretical and applied knowledge-making. From the multi-field perspective of futures studies, this motivates a structured effort to explore, map and display the current dynamics of environmental futures research and discourse in the light of evolving practices, frameworks, projects and research structures within the scope of this special issue.
The Change Progression Scenario Method (CPSM) offers a unique approach to strategic planning by challenging the conventional assumption that the future will unfold in a predictable, linear manner. CPSM actively explores potential future scenarios within four levels of change: No Change, Marginal Change, Adaptive Change, and Radical Change. This method is systematically analyzed in thirty-one studies across various domains including policy, government, schooling, buildings, and development. The review consolidates the practical applications of CPSM and positions it as a middle-range theory for diagnosing system changes. CPSM elucidates why and how systems often resist significant transformations, even during crises. In diverse contexts, stakeholders tend to gravitate towards adaptive changes, creating what the review terms an adaptive trap, a preference for adjustments that preserve fundamental beliefs, identities, and power structures. Furthermore, the analysis indicates that CPSM achieves its most comprehensive understanding when integrated with Causal Layered Analysis and the Futures Triangle. This integration ensures that superficial policy changes align with deeper shifts in worldviews and linguistic practices. The review underscores the particular utility of CPSM in post-colonial and Global South settings, where it can challenge externally imposed futures and promote alternative knowledge systems. However, the review also notes potential misuses of CPSM, such as its co-optation by those in power or superficial application of drastic options. The work concludes by identifying gaps in current understanding, particularly the lack of long-term studies on CPSM’s implementation, and emphasizes its critical role in diagnosing the challenges of achieving meaningful change in governance.
Rethinking human relationships with the natural world alongside forging sustainable eco-future paths is becoming increasingly urgent amidst worsening environmental crises. This study is designed to explore how indigenous knowledge systems portrayed in African literature can help imagine sustainable futures. Grounded in the close reading and content analysis of diverse voices, perspectives, and works such as Kenya’s Wangari Maathai’s Unbowed: A Memoir (2006), South Africa’s Zakes Mda’s The Heart of Redness (2000), and Nigeria’s Tanure Ojaide’s Daydream of Ants and Other Poems (2011), this paper illuminates how indigenous knowledge systems in narratives can offer innovative alternative routes to creating and communicating images of environmental futures. Drawing from the rich mosaic of indigenous knowledge that coevolved with local ecosystems over the ages, the selected African literary works provide a fertile foundation for envisioning eco-futures. Therefore, this study examines how literary representations of traditional ecological practices, respect for ancestral lands, and spiritual connections to the natural world challenge dominant Western extractivism and anthropocentrism. Furthermore, the study explores how these works leverage indigenous knowledge systems by focusing on depictions of resource management, sacred landscapes, and the interconnectedness between humans and nature. This investigation thus foregrounds that African literary aesthetics and ecological wisdom create a vital platform for transmitting knowledge, offering valuable insights from indigenous knowledge systems for shaping more sustainable environmental concerns. By fostering a deeper understanding of these alternative perspectives, this research aims to contribute to broader discussions about environmental knowledge production and actions toward a more harmonious relationship with ecosystems. Taken together, in African cosmology, the environment is revered as Mother Earth, with origins, beliefs, ethics, and values intricately linked to the forests, wildlife, and the land. As environmental consciousness grows in the 21st century, this study sheds light on how African indigenous eco-awareness can contribute to ecological sustainability and reoriented values.
This article presents a speculative design project and discusses its potential to facilitate a mutually beneficial cohabitation between humans, nonhuman species, and the natural environment. Currently, digital-simulated nature and nonhumans within our society (including species and objects) often fail to cultivate a responsible and sustainable future because most of them excessively cater to human entertainment. This research draws on philosophies, game studies, and design studies regarding human-computer interaction (HCI) and proposes an alternative approach: Wanderer , a mobile application developed around preliminary design principles informed by our theoretical frameworks. The app advocates for more-than-human and multi-species futures by utilizing three pillars in speculative design: a semi-virtual nature environment, un-interactive interaction, and system design. The result contributes to dissolving the boundaries between humans and nonhumans, indoor and outdoor environments, and virtual and real worlds. Through system thinking and interaction design, we propose posthuman-computer interaction (postHCI), which refuses human exceptionalism and human-centered views in conventional HCI by considering ecological systems and humans’ relationships with nonhumans via the interaction between humans and computers. The paper translates theoretical frameworks to visual design and programming regarding posthuman thinking and opens a discussion on alternative interactions between humans, nonhumans, and nature.
Zambia’s vision to attain middle-income status by 2030 and its strategic development plan are anchored on environmental sustainability. The main constraints to achieving these future goals are climate change and biodiversity loss. A missing aspect identified in the governance of biodiversity and climate is the limited participation of stakeholders in resource management. Engagement of multiple perspectives and plural values held by stakeholders and their relation to future management choices and sustainable outcomes through participatory future visioning processes is largely missing, particularly in biodiversity-rich mosaics such as the Barotse Cultural Landscape. This missing link has had powerful policy implications, as governance, in many instances, has produced, reproduced and upheld power structures that ignore locally and culturally relevant narratives necessary for transformative change. Using individual interviews and a participatory futures workshop with actors in the biodiversity and climate governance space in the Barotse Cultural Landscape, this study explores how futures methods can contribute to locally-led transformative change pathways. The Seeds of Good Anthropocenes approach is used to identify bottom-up biodiversity and climate initiatives in Zambia. They are used to develop alternative futures grounded in reality using the Nature Futures Framework nature value perspectives, i.e. Nature for Nature, Nature for Society and Nature as Culture, to gain an understanding of the local actors’ value perspectives. The study answers the question of what the pluralistic values and nature perspectives of the local actors in the Barotse Cultural Landscape are towards biodiversity and climate governance. This study contributes to the call to apply the Nature Futures Framework and operationalise its use.
