Shaping Inclusive Foresight: A Fun, Educational Approach

UN Global Pulse launched a tool that helps people reflect about participatory foresight approaches.

By Amy Lynn Smith — Independent Writer + Strategist

UN Global Pulse wants to make futures and foresight thinking as accessible as possible for everyone. That means creating tools and approaches anyone can apply to help them imagine a better future — for the UN and the world.

At the end of November, UN Global Pulse introduced one such tool, called Futures Cards, at the Dubai Futures Forum. True to the philosophy of Global Pulse’s Foresight team, the deck of cards was designed using a set of foresight exercises. The end result is an imaginative, engaging way for people to make foresight and futures thinking a dynamic experience that invites everyone to take part.

The Futures Cards are a gamified learning experience designed to help individuals and teams develop their knowledge and skills in inclusive and participatory foresight. The deck of cards has recommendations on one side and “what if” prompts on the other side. Players take turns drawing cards and responding to the prompts or questions.

The cards align with the UN Principles for Future Generations by helping participants make inclusive and decolonial decisions to benefit future generations.

“At Global Pulse, our guiding compass is that the future belongs to everybody, and everybody should be able to design it,” says Claudia Saénz Zulueta, Strategic Foresight Senior Analyst. “Trying to incorporate many people into the process is key to helping people shape the future they want to see. The gamification aspect of the cards tries to make it easier for people to generate ideas and share their reflections.”

Looking into the future

According to Saénz Zulueta, the goal of the cards is to help colleagues learn from each other and expand their thinking about futures and foresight practices. While making learning fun, the cards are suitable for everyone from experienced foresight practitioners to people who are new to foresight. The cards can be used individually or in teams to explore new ideas and areas for improvement, facilitate team brainstorming sessions and co-designing during workshops, and assess how inclusive a team’s futures and foresight practices are.

Here’s an example of one card. The recommendation is, “Examine the power dynamics and historical inequalities that have shaped the context in which you’re working.” The “what if” question on the other side prompts thoughts on a specific situation: “What if you discovered that the foresight process you currently use inadvertently reinforces colonial biases and historical inequalities?” That’s accompanied by a follow-up question to give users agency at an individual or team level. In this case: “How would you revise and decolonise the process?”

By using “what if” prompts instead of providing definitive answers, the team was intentional about avoiding “one-size-fits-all” solutions. Instead, they wanted to create thought-provoking questions that would encourage people to take a closer look at the unique challenges and opportunities they face. But the cards are designed to do more than spark ideas. The “how would you” question encourages users to move from thought to concrete action.

“The cards are intended to prompt collaboration, individual reflection — or both,” Saénz Zulueta says. “As an international organization, the UN must consider, respect, and integrate diverse approaches to build a better future for all. Using participatory approaches is a must. We can’t apply foresight only in a strategic way, but also in a deeply human way. The goal is to empower individuals to take ownership of their futures to create a more just and equitable world.”

Making foresight more participatory and inclusive

The Futures Cards started with a research project in early 2023, with the goal of developing a way to make foresight accessible to everyone. The cards’ content and concept was designed by Global Pulse’s Saénz Zulueta with the support of Jimena Califa, Design Strategist and Foresight Analyst, working with UN Global Pulse’s team and outside experts.

“Our first idea was to make a document like a report or a zine, but we realised the cards are easy to engage with, as they have short prompts — like a bite-sized taste of something new you can bring to the table to nurture your discussion and invite more people to actively collaborate and share ideas or reflections,” Califa says.

The project team used a foresight exercise known as visioning to imagine an ideal future for foresight practices. Next, participants shared what’s known as a “message from the future” — recommendations for how to make the ideal future a reality. Through a process that included brainstorming and conceptualising, the team generated numerous ideas for topics to include on the Futures Cards.

The team then grouped the ideas by categories and validated the categories with a selection of partners and collaborators, including experts in decolonial foresight. The project team wrote the “what if” prompts and recommendations, again validating them with outside input to ensure the broadest possible perspective and eliminate any potential bias.

Gathering multiple viewpoints helped ensure the Futures Cards emphasise inclusivity and diversity, along with the focus on future generations. What’s more, Global Pulse recognises that foresight has an important role to play in challenging dominant ways of thinking about the future that have been shaped by the past. Tools like the Futures Cards offer another way to center the perspectives and experiences of historically underrepresented communities — using foresight to provide a space for diverse voices and perspectives to be heard in the process of envisioning possible futures.

“We acknowledge the foresight experts and futurists, including Indigenous practitioners, who supported the creation of these cards,” Saénz Zulueta says. “They inspired us with their work or by directly contributing their insights to design recommendations and ‘what if’ prompts.”

This diversity of perspectives is reflected in the design of the Futures Cards, the work of Shanice Da Costa, Creative Communications Officer at UN Global Pulse.

“The design request was to build an illustration system that allows people to relate prompts, recommendations, and principles, but not in a structured way,” Califa says. “The first time we saw the illustrations we loved them and thought about a kaleidoscope, whose reflections produce changing patterns when rotated. We see diversity and inclusion in the illustrations: many different shapes and colours coexisting in harmony and even giving life to new ones.”

Putting the cards into practice

When the Futures Cards were launched at the Dubai Futures Forum — at a booth that featured a large board with a prompt and a space for people to share their answer on a sticky note — a special edition was printed out and given to visitors so they could see how the cards could be used.

Anyone who wants to use the cards can download them here at no cost. There are two versions, one suitable for digital use and the other one for printing. The print version is A4 size and includes four cards per page, ready to print and cut. UN Global Pulse recommends setting the printer to landscape format, double-sided, and folding on the short edge.

Here’s how UN Global Pulse suggests using the cards:

1. Shuffle the cards and place them with the recommendations facing up.
2. All players agree on the playing order and every player grabs one card.
3. The round begins. The first player reads the recommendation and prompts on their card out loud.
4. All players take a moment to think about their response to the “what if” and “how would you” prompts.
5. When they’re ready, all players share their responses with the group.
6. The group discusses the answers and builds on each others’ ideas.
7. The next player continues, starting from step three.

Optional: A player can give one point to each idea suggested that builds on another. The player with the most points wins.

Of course, since the Futures Cards are designed for use both in teams and by individuals — and creativity is integral to foresight — people may discover new ways to make good use of the cards.

“If we want to see a diverse and inclusive future, let’s shape it!” Saénz Zulueta says. “Working on foresight means handling a lot of information about current challenges and future uncertainties. In day-to-day practice we might get lost in the middle of the urgent, but this set of cards is designed to put the spotlight on the important role people play in imagining and creating better futures.”