Effective futures exercises seek to challenge the status quo and our assumptions to open up new possibilities – both positive and negative. They often seek to change the present narrative.
Unfortunately, many discussions of Aotearoa New Zealand futures don’t seem to explore much of the imaginative space. The desired future state that tends to emerge in workshops, and opinion pieces, is a green and pleasant land (and healthy oceans), with regenerative agriculture, environmental restoration, greater social justice & equity, and vague circular economies.
There is nothing wrong with those ideals. They are common in many scenarios from elsewhere too. But the desirable kiwi future often feels like a slightly higher tech version of the Shire from Lord of the rings. Doing what we have done for the last 150 years, but better. That has not moved us beyond the “farm and theme park” mindset that Paul Callaghan pushed back against over a decade ago.
This, I think, reflects a dominant narrative about Aotearoa New Zealand - “Our economic development has been built on food production. Growing stuff is what we do well, and will continue to do.”
We see our “competitive advantage” as efficient pastoral agriculture and horticulture, so that’s where most of our effort goes. To an extent that is a reasonable position. However, it has also led to complacency, as can be seen from the continued dominance of commodity products.
New Zealand’s exports, by value, in 2020. Source: Atlas of Economic Complexity.
Avoiding complacency
It can also prevent us thinking about what if that advantage disappears.
Yes, the economy has been diversifying. There is a growing emphasis on enhancing the “bioeconomy”, where higher value products (such as chemicals and specialised materials) are created. This has proven easier said than done so far, as the diagram above illustrates.
But, the economic contributions of services and information technology have also been growing. And there has been a push to improve the manufacturing sector. Aotearoa now has a modest space industry. We also have WētāFX, marine design and technology companies, a growing health technology sector, successful digital game developers, and other innovative firms.
NZ’s exports over the last 25 years, based on sector and value. Source: Atlas of Economic Complexity.
But most people don’t, yet, appear to imagine a plausible future Aotearoa as an industrial or technology “power house.” This is, in part, because there’s no strong narrative to compete against the “Growing stuff” one.
An economy where farming is still an important part of the future may be the most likely future. But it isn’t something that we should assume, or sleepwalk into. By not carefully imagining and exploring other possibilities means other opportunities can be overlooked or poorly prepared for.
One of the reasons for our generally limited imagination may be that the future of farming is frequently discussed, with scenarios of more sustainable or regenerative futures highlighted, usually by industry groups. Examples include FMG, Beef + Lamb, BNZ, and Pure Advantage. There isn’t the same championing of other futures.
Creating other narratives and worldviews
Another reason is that creating effective new narratives can be hard. It isn’t done by throwing out new terms, which seems to be normal practice currently. We hear a lot about “Industry 4.0”, “deep tech”, the “metaverse”, and “radical transformation.” These, along with many other similar terms are common in futures, and policy, thinking, business PR, and research proposals. But they can quickly become “magic word solutionism.” Vague terms that, repeated often enough, become trends in themselves:
“… there is always a danger when a term becomes a trend, because it starts to become a short-cut for thinking—a term without precision—where everybody thinks they know what it means, but nobody really does for sure.”
Narratives represent a central idea or deeper meaning that is more than just a phrase or a story. As the Narrative Initiative explains, narratives emerge from worldviews and values. For example, “New Zealand helps feed the world” is a common worldview (or frame) of how we see ourselves. The narrative of “we are good at growing stuff” comes from that.
Stories make narratives relatable. They describe something happening (to someone or something). So, a story of a farming family from Inglewood who adopted a lower input approach to their beef and dairy farm and improved production and biodiversity can be an illustration of a narrative about being good farmers and environmental stewards.
Paul Callaghan brought a different narrative to public attention, through his “Wool to Weta” book and his other writings and talks. He emphasised that there are other avenues for kiwi ingenuity that could create better economic opportunities and living standards.
The stories of WētāFX, Rocket Lab, Animation Research Ltd, Xero, Fisher & Paykel Healthcare, etc support that narrative. But they still seem to be seen by many as exceptions or add-ons to an agricultural-based future of Aotearoa. The generational heft of farming narratives persists.
That suggests that alternative worldviews are needed so new narratives and futures are seen as viable, not just anecdotes.
Futures thinking is most effective when it explores different worldviews
That’s where futures thinking can help create stronger connections between stories, narratives, and values. Futures methods help breakthrough biases, stretch the imagination, create new worldviews, and support new narratives. Simplistic approaches, such as two-by-two matrices favoured by typical business consultants, aren’t the answer. These only produce superficial futures, with no story telling power. “Conceptual flatlands” according to Curry & Schultz.
More intensive and participatory methods are required to move beyond the familiar and obvious. One example of a more engaging way of imagining desirable futures is through using the “seeds approach.”
In one of my recent projects a “seed” I planted was the possibility of Aotearoa developing a new chemical industry, through studying and replicating chemical reactions occurring around marine black smokers. Just like the undersea world, there are unexplored futures for us to still consider.