Future Visioning

6. Civic Knowledge and Skills

This introductory article was written by ChatGPT at the direction of Heidi Burgess, who reviewed, edited, and approved the final content.
For more information

July 10, 2026

“If you don’t know where you are going, it is going to be very difficult to get there.” This is as true for communities and societies as it is for individuals. People engaged in conflict often know precisely what they oppose, but have only a vague idea of the future they hope to create. They may devote most of their energy to defeating an adversary, stopping a particular policy, or overturning an existing institution. Without a sufficiently clear vision of the desired future, however, it is difficult to choose effective strategies, recognize progress, coordinate separate efforts, or determine whether a proposed settlement is actually moving society in the right direction.

A future vision is more than a prediction. It is an image of what people want their community or society to become and of the principles that should guide the effort to build it. A useful vision can turn diffuse dissatisfaction into purposeful action. It can help people identify the gap between present conditions and desired ones, set priorities, and develop intermediate goals. It also provides a standard against which policies and conflict interventions can be judged. The important question becomes not simply whether an action hurts an opponent or produces a short-term victory, but whether it helps create the kind of society people ultimately want.

In deeply divided societies, a viable vision must also make room for people on the other side. Fantasies in which opponents surrender, disappear, or permanently accept subordinate status are unlikely to produce a stable peace. At the societal level, adversaries generally remain neighbors, fellow citizens, coworkers, and participants in the same institutions. A durable future must therefore protect the dignity, security, rights, and legitimate interests of people with whom one strongly disagrees. This does not require abandoning justice or accepting abusive behavior. It means developing a future that opponents can at least live with, rather than one they will feel compelled to resist indefinitely. Whenever possible, members of the affected groups should participate in imagining that shared future.

Future visioning can also loosen the grip of the past. Historical grievances must be acknowledged, but conflicts become trapped when every proposal is judged only through memories of betrayal and injury. A positive shared vision invites people to ask what they might build together, even when they cannot agree completely about what happened before. The vision will seldom be a detailed blueprint, and it will need to change as circumstances change. Its purpose is to provide a broadly acceptable direction: a society in which conflicts continue, but are handled without dehumanization, repression, or violence. Once such a destination becomes visible, people can begin identifying the many practical steps needed to move toward it.

—————————

This page was created by ChatGPT in response to this prompt. It was then reviewed, edited, supplemented and approved by Heidi Burgess. More information about how and why we are using AI in this way, and about the growing number of ways in which Beyond Intractability is using ChatGPT, Claude and other AI systems to generate content and build out the BI system, is available on our BI/AI Overview Page.

—————————