Futurology in a future of uncertainty

Futurology is the art of predicting future trends based on current trends and scientific advances. It is perhaps the modern equivalent of soothsayers but based within both mathematical and social science paradigms.

Extrapolating scenarios of the future based on existing reality takes into account a lot of assumptions which allow models to be created to describe plausible realities.

In some areas like economics there are well established assumptions, future economic trends play through in the modelling of the value of assets, the depreciation elements of how much the value of something deteriorates with age and the inflation models of how much more things cost in the future, and assumptions about different market demand and need options.

In population modelling there are assumptions about fertility and birth rates and death rates and the impacts of migration shifts. These can be combined with health assumptions to create future scenarios for health demand which can be used for workforce and service planning.

However most models become less and less reliable as the time horizon extends, i.e. short term futurology over the next 2-5yrs is reasonably accurate and can be extrapolated out more easily than longer term over 10-20yrs.

I was recently asked to reflect on the potential future landscape of the use of green space in cities in the 5-6yrs time. It was a really interesting bit of thought space because over that timespan there are some predictable changes in terms of shrinking state resources and governance, increased focus on community ownership, increasing pressures of diseases of aging as life expectancy remains extended and the current ill health in middle age plays through into frailty in older age, increased demand of urban housing pressuring green space balancing with carbon sink potential of green space and rewinding narratives.

However as I was reflecting there were some major uncertainties that impact on futurology even in this short time frame, most notable the potential of global conflict. Something which given the conflicts in Ukraine and Gaza combined with the rise of extremist politics globally seems increasingly likely within my lifetime. This level of uncertainty is difficult to model futures for as global conflict is such a significant social and economic disruption, especially as the way that war is waged is evolving at a rapid pace.

Although we have just come through a massive disruption of Covid there are some differences with global conflict, particularly in terms of social tension and cohesion issues and the demographics of mortality which in war tend to be working age adults, particularly men.

Sometime ago I convened a workshop between Birmingham City Council and the University of Birmingham to explore the ramifications of global conflict on the city in the short, medium and long term. This was quite hard to convene in trying to find the right mix of people to shape the thinking space and also landing it with the senior officers to carve out enough protected time for the valuable thinking.

It became a fascinating exploration of lessons from history about global conflict impact on cities combined with the learning from the impacts of Covid halting international trade and disruption of supply chains and futurology for what conflict in the future would look like.

The workshop explored the impact of global conflict in the context of 2-5yrs post conflict, 5-10yrs and >10yr landscape of the city, avoiding to some extent the mid-conflict impacts and focusing more on the recovery and rebuilding phase. The discussions were fascinating and wide ranging with presentations from academics that brought to life lessons from both recent and past history. The key reflections were that:

• Cities bear the brunt of global conflicts harder than rural areas, this is a combination of population & housing density, economic reliance on professional services and tourism which downturn post-conflict, loss of working age adults to defence services which demographically hits cities harder because of younger demographics, disruption to academic and educational anchors, just-in-time supply chains with limited reserve capacity for food/resources, social cohesion issues as cities tend to be more globally diverse and will have communities from all sides of the conflicts, and the additional layer that cities are often primary conflict targets so experience physical damage and loss.
• Cities recovering after major conflict rely heavily on community cohesion and community anchored organisations to leverage individuals to collaborate into recovery. Cities have uniquely global populations, something particularly true of Birmingham, and this means in any conflict there are likely to be significant populations present from both sides which may bring the conflict onto the streets locally. This disruption of community cohesion is likely to be more deeply felt and visible in cities and that means rebuilding community safety, cohesion and connection with place is key to the recovery of cities. The community infrastructure can be created post conflict but in cities where they were in existence prior to the conflict and maintained and engaged by the state through the events this recovery was easier, which is a powerful message for cities today to consider.
• Cities faced significant financial restraint in post-conflict eras, whether directly impacted by conflict or indirectly, the public purse is very restricted and the impact of migration (internal and external) means that buildings are rapidly evolved into housing over other functionality. The remaining public estate becomes multi-functional and multi-organisational with public services becoming closer aligned in delivery, governance and employment. Currently many public organisations are down-sizing following the shifts to hybrid working post-covid and reviewing estates and moving to multi-functional, multi-organisational hubs rakes intention but can create a baseline which is more resilient for this future scenario.
• Cities require strong authentic and compassionate cross-agency leadership in the post-conflict recovery phase to hold together communities and set a clear vision whilst being honest about the current hardship realities. This requires leaders who have experience across multiple public sector realms with good understanding of the national-local dynamic. Developing these leaders is something that does need investment, too often public sector leaders have linear careers within specific domains such as health or local government or national civil service, and this needs to be evolved into more diverse career portfolios encourages by terms and conditions and learning pathways which value and develop transferable skills and accumulation of cross-sectoral experience.

The discussions fed into strategic thinking for the future and as we go through tough times locally will continue to shape the approach, but they are useful reflections hopefully for others as well.

So what does this mean for futurology at the moment? Futurology is the art of describing possible futures and at the moment it feels that any future casting of the runes must consider the escalation of global conflict and its impact both during and post-conflict on society. Acknowledging the uncertainty of the current climate and the potential of this kind of massive disruption may helps us navigate what is coming in the future.

The lessons from this type of extreme scenario planning and testing are useful in the short term as well as the long term for what we all hope is something that won't come to pass. Considering the impact of global conflict is a powerful paradigm which has the potential to test our thinking and help us build better, stronger and more resilient communities and organisations.

Finally I want to acknowledge the context in which I write. We have the huge privilege that it is unlikely that in the UK we will experience fighting in the streets of our cities with a foreign power but we cannot assume that there won't be physical impacts of bombing and terrorist attacks. As I watched the horrific scenes from Gaza and Ukraine, I am in awe of the public servants who are trying to hold these cities and countries together in the midst of overwhelming assaults. I was lucky to spend time with a counterpart from Palestine once at a global public health meeting in Italy. She was a brilliant public health physician and public servant, her compassion, wisdom, resilience and the reality of her life trying to improve the health of her country's people against incredible challenges was humbling. My thoughts and prayers are with her and her family.