Reflection on the Emergence Academy 2023
Earlier this month I returned to Hawkwood for a reunion of different ‘fellows’ from the Emergence Academy. The Emergence Academy is:
“a regenerative learning ecosystem that guides leaders of today and leaders of tomorrow through unique experiences in the use and application of Futures Literacy; developing and deepening shared understanding and language to bridge gaps in organizational hierarchy and foster our transition towards greater resilience, an openness to spontaneity and an appreciation for not knowing.” (web link)
There’s a lot to unpack in here, not least what we mean by Futures Literacy. Although this is language that I think is more widely used in other parts of Europe, I don’t feel like it’s very common in the UK, at least not outside of academic circles. The basic principle of futures literacy is that the future is already present, and observable, in the present — and that it shows up in the form of the (anticipatory) assumptions that we are making about the future. These assumptions are often unconscious, but they shape our choices nevertheless. (A classic example is the ‘ceteris paribus’ principle in economic modelling: everything else remaining the same, into the future — an absurdity in our volatile and climate-disrupted world, and yet one most of us bet on every day, when we save into our pensions, for example). To become futures literate is to develop the capability to surface or reveal these assumptions, and as a consequence to widen the lens and imagine a greater range of possibilities. (This short from the Hanzehogeschool Groningen sets it out much more succinctly than me).
There are tested tools and practices available to enable this, and there are lots of case studies set out in Riel Miller’s Transforming the Future (2018). (And in the first iteration of the programme we learned how to apply these in a ‘lab’ setting). Most futures thinking and futures tools focus on probable / possible futures and are closely linked to goal-setting: we identify scenarios in order to minimise or even eliminate uncertainty, we work back from these. One of the problems with this approach is that it quickly blurs into a kind of determinism; the desired future is presented as the only possible future, and those who have the most ability to impose their desire on the future (because of the ways in which they control narrative in the present) get to “colonise tomorrow with today’s idea of tomorrow.” This unconscious strategy has been very successful; it’s no big surprise that scenario-planning as a professional practice has its origins in big oil, and we are currently seeing exactly this type of imagination takeover in the way that a small number of tech companies are controlling how we talk about our future with AI.
Set against these anticipations-for-planning is another way of seeing the world: anticipation-for-emergence. If traditional, planning-oriented forms of anticipation push us towards certainty and as a consequence constrain our perception of novelty in the present, anticipation-for-emergence, facilitates this. It “helps to deconstruct those aspects of the present that are held in place by existing expected and desired futures” (Miller 2018, p.22). By opening up our awareness of existing but often invisible novelty in the present (rather than just looking for signals that confirm the assumed, planned-for future) the theory is that we also become better able to invent and innovate, to create new worlds. And if, as is oft repeated, our current predicament is, above all, a crisis of the imagination — an inability to imagine how the world could be organised in ways that are not grounded in extractive capitalism — then this is a capability we need to exercise more than ever.
So what?
So what did this look like in practice for the reunion? Partly this was an exercise in taking the time to reflect on how in our work and practice we are cultivating this capability. But we also used the time to explore in more depth how we use narrative and storytelling to foster these capabilities. One technique we used was to tell each other stories (this could be about a problem past or present, a situation in need of a resolution) and then pass these on through retelling. What was interesting here was the new views that arise when you let go of a story, and are able to hear it as if for the first time. We also spent a lot of time cultivating deep connection with the living world (although perhaps not as much as we had in July…). What happens when you surrender to a place, open yourself up to the ecosystem, and create space for whatever emerges in that slowing down, and deep observation?
It’s hard to summarise the takeaways into clear learning points — instead I am taking away questions to guide my practice in the new year:
- How am I making space for emergence in my own life and practice? The practice of observation, of slowing down, or a sit spot is incredibly important for me to maintain my balance. And yet… I find it hard to integrate in my life. How can I cultivate this openness (to not knowing) more deliberately?
- If leadership is both the the responsibility to hold a story, to make it ‘sticky’ (and therefore compelling and memorable) and at the same time the responsibility to let it go (in order to create the distance that opens up new perspectives) how can I become a better storyteller?
- At the same time, how can I also be more open to the different stories that people might tell about a problem or project? How can I actively remember that mine is not the only version? (letting go again)
- And how can I ensure that in our practices of planning and future-scoping we always ‘walk with two legs’ (planning for anticipation, and for emergence)? How can we make sure that we surface early on the assumptions that we are all making about the future — in order to increase the range of possibilities available to us. This is a very live question in planning our upcoming AI and community action lab.
This may be over-simplistic, but I find myself coming back time and again to Jiddu Krishnamurti as cited by Oliver Burkeman. The secret, he explained, is to ‘not mind what happens’. Of course, we all deeply care what happens — and I wouldn’t have spent my professional life in activism if I didn’t — but at the same time, there is deep wisdom in being able to step back, observe and apply curiosity when things don’t turn out as we hope. There are some areas of my life where I am very good at this — I am genuinely very stoical / open when it comes to delayed trains or disrupted plans — but in outcomes for my projects, not so much. And maybe the art of futures literacy is to cultivate, observe and work with this tension.
