Unregulated Futures: Scenario Planning for the Unknown

Crawford, Megan; Roubelat, Fabrice; Marchais-Roubelat, Anne

Abstract

Building from years of piloting novel methods for future visioning through group engagement, this curated session will take attendees through a fast-tracked, yet fully- immersive scenario planning workshop. The prompt is, “What does 2034 look like if AI is regulated by all (i.e. not governable)?” The session aims to capitalize on our globally shared anticipation of an emerging technology, focused into an unknown and possibly unrecognizable future (Crawford & Wright, 2022; 2024). The prompt deep dives into one of the main perspectives and uses of AI today (bottom-up). Through an Intuitive Logics method of scenario planning, a small team will lead attendees from ideation to implications. This format is designed to engage as many as possible, generating interdisciplinary discussions, with supportive tech available to ensure all have equal opportunities to be heard.
Scenario planning is a participatory activity delivered through iterative stages that inspire creative, causal, evaluative, and holistic thinking (Van der Heijden, 2005). The method is used primarily by Fortune 500 companies to develop and test strategies, but we are working to bring this tool to broader audiences. This session will capitalize on the diversity of attendees to reflect back how “we” view a future with few voices vs a future with all voices.
This curated session will expose attendees to novel methods for strategically envisioning the future. One aim is to back-cast scenarios of unregulated AI for the purposes of informing today’s actions. Another is to build on our repository of data from scenario planning sessions. The quality and quantity of ideas that attendees bring to the proverbial table can help the futures and foresight field better understand how people anticipate the future, where our collective limitations are, the values we place on ideologies, sociocultural identities, and how much our past influences are abilities to innovate.

Citation

Crawford, M., Roubelat, F., & Marchais-Roubelat, A. (2024, September). Unregulated Futures: Scenario Planning for the Unknown. Presented at Anticipation 2024, Lancaster, UK

• Presentation Conference Type: Other
• Conference Name: Anticipation 2024
• Start Date: Sep 11, 2024
• End Date: Sep 14, 2024
• Deposit Date: Apr 29, 2024
• Keywords: scenario planning, AI, regulations, governance, stakeholder engagement
• Public URL: http://researchrepository.napier.ac.uk/Output/3603039
• Related Public URLs: https://www.lancaster.ac.uk/social-futures/events/anticipation-conference-2024/