Scanning Explained: Environmental Scanning vs Horizon Scanning

In this article, I will try to make some clarity on the various activities carried out at the very beginning of foresight practice to look for the forces of change in the environment before creating scenario narratives. All these activities fall under the umbrella term of “scanning”. However, under that umbrella term, different terms, such as “environmental scanning”, “horizon scanning”, “emerging issues analysis”, etc. involve rather distinct scanning practices, so I will attempt to demystify what each term means and involves, with a special focus on the often misunderstood difference between environmental scanning and horizon scanning. I will attempt to shed some light on the rather chaotic academic and non-academic literature on this topic, and lay out transparently many view points before providing my own suggestions on what I think are crucial practical guidelines when we do scanning.

Environmental Scanning

The idea of scanning the environment dates back to research done by Francis Joseph Aguilar in the 1960s at Columbia University…