Tokyo College Event: “Transnational Think Tanks: Shaping Futures”

Abstract

Imaginings of the future are increasingly being placed on the agenda of both public and private organizations as a way to prepare for, make visible, and ultimately master the unknown and the not-yet. Think tanks have become playgrounds for the assemblage of ‘signals’ and ‘evidence’ of emerging trends, and training camps for established and aspiring top leaders who strive be ‘future literate’. The ways in which think tank experts understand and attempt to anticipate futures through projections, narratives, and actionable knowledge, and how they intervene in public debates may inform us of how contemporary social problems are both articulated and given salience. This talk addresses the creation of future narratives in US-based, transnational think tanks, with a view to the combinatorial use of metrics, imagination, and speculation. What kinds of knowledge is brought into play and created? What are the tools and technologies used in future foresight exercises? How are the outcomes of future foresight exercises made credible and authoritative? The talk also discusses how seemingly playful exercises are rendered powerful as significant resources for future leadership, and thus potentially performative. 

Program    

Lecturer
Christina GARSTEN
(Professor, Tokyo College; Professor, Uppsala University and Stockholm University; Principal, Swedish Collegium for Advanced Study (SCAS))
 
Commentator
John LIE
(Professor, Tokyo College; Professor; University of California, Berkeley)
 
Moderator
SHIMAZU Naoko
(Professor, Tokyo College)