1. FTA 2006 – Impressions and Directions
Luke Georghiou
Chair Conference Technical Committee
and PREST, Manchester Business School

2. The numbers game
160 participants, 35 countries, 50 papers, 17 e-posters, 5 themes and 6 working groups
51 methods in 13 families
800 foresight studies on EFMN
Highlighting growing areas of activity that are not strongly visible in the public domain
Higher Education, Business, Developing country
A large enterprise the boundaries of which are not well defined or understood

3. Opening shots
Underlying question of how FTA influences the policy process
Challenged by statement that better FTA only leads to better decisions when decisions are based on logic but usually they are not
Rumsfeld:
Reports that say that something hasn't happened are always interesting to me, because as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns — the ones we don't know we don't know
Is policy influence the same as influencing decisions?

4. γνώθι σεαυτόν Reflexivity Cross-cutting theme of epistemology of FTA
“FTA is not science” – seeking roots in social science and humanities
Karl Popper resurrected:
Poverty of Historicism
Conjectures and Refutations and falsifiability of knowledge

5. Construct or adapt
“Much more than a tool box – an instrument for the social construction of the future”
Contrast with a conference keyword “adaptive”
Foresight in the world of open innovation
Bottom up approaches
A more modest interpretation of the collective ability to shape the future
Adapt to the future as shaped by others

6. The play’s the thing – the dominance of scenarios
In HE and Business streams clearly emerging as the favoured communication device with policymakers
Trigger a good discussion and make a lasting impression – balance radicality and extrapolation
Normative/explorative divide not always explicit or even intentional
as strong a problem among experts as among users
Role of operators/organisers of FTA in shaping outcomes also not always explicit even when publicly attributing outcomes to content experts
Dark scenarios will expand our vocabulary
Cannot underestimate the importance of words – names and taxonomies are loaded with layers of meaning

7. Understand why the client wants FTA
Many of the business stream papers presenting lists of motivations
Stimulating coherence, change, resilience, organisational quality, confidence internally and externally
FTA in business vs FTA for business
Presentation and results always more important than methods once threshold of trust achieved
Consolidation of trends
Bottom-up platforms
Exclusion of SMEs

8. Convergence with Policy domain
FTA as policy intelligence vs FTA as policy instrument
Facilitating, improving policymaking, informing and Symbolic function
FTA is engaged with some key policy issues eg regulatory foresight but is it properly integrated in a policy process
Embedded in endogenous cultural process

9. Ways forward No easy solutions
Boundaries will remain fuzzy – we cannot even be clear about the T in FTA
Way forward lies in accumulating experience and subjecting it to careful evaluation and validation
Work with client and user communities to develop “intelligent customers”
Training
Cooperative working
Resource issue for developing countries
Need for our communities to support theirs
Some signs of the emergence of a discipline with this conference an important step along the way