Regional Foresight:Deployment in AfricaAbstract Overview Summary
Large Scale Architecture
abstract
The title "regional foresight" brings together three decades of exercises (1990-2010), seemingly disparate but whose common point is the use of "large-scale architecture". This approach of sequencing major requirements and possible responses contributes to the foresight "royal way" as futurology (40s) and systems dynamic (70s) - peppered with alterations and omissions - arouse controversies under the effect of unanticipated crises and shocks.
Keywords
Region, research and Africa, which were largely forgotten in prospective studies until the early 90s, are at the heart of these exercises, while the treatment that national and sectoral studies with global pretensions continue to reflect a rigid determinism.
Because of their mere existence, regional foresight exercises close the gap of African countries in terms of national studies, neutralizing the anchoring biases that enclose in the controversy over the reality of independence. Africa is the cradle as a continent unique in terms of its history, size, population, level of development, diversity and first-mover through a structure in zones, blocks and groupings of countries.
These exercises are part of the humanist vision of foresight that the founding father G. Berger had and dedicate the return to the sources of the four principles that defined it: to see far, to see broadly, to analyze in depth, to take risks. They put foresight back in its rightful place, that of a methodological paradigm whose combination with a constructivist epistemology and a transformative or experimental ontology stimulates the volitive dynamics that supplant the positivist hard core of policy analysis and its normative protective crown in which traditional approach was a part.
Because of their mere existence, regional foresight exercises close the gap of African countries in terms of national studies, neutralizing the anchoring biases that enclose in the controversy over the reality of independence. Africa is the cradle as a continent unique in terms of its history, size, population, level of development, diversity and first-mover through a structure in zones, blocks and groupings of countries.
These exercises are part of the humanist vision of foresight that the founding father G. Berger had and dedicate the return to the sources of the four principles that defined it: to see far, to see broadly, to analyze in depth, to take risks. They put foresight back in its rightful place, that of a methodological paradigm whose combination with a constructivist epistemology and a transformative or experimental ontology stimulates the volitive dynamics that supplant the positivist hard core of policy analysis and its normative protective crown in which traditional approach was a part.
As a grid of analysis, the volitive dynamics will be useful to sift through events and initiatives that are sure to have an impact on Africa such as B3W and SCaN
Keywords
Paradigm, Foresight, Africa, Science, UN, Resilience, UEMOA, Regional Integration, CFA Franc Zone, Europe, Large Scale Architecture, Volitive Dynamics, Futurology, Systems Dynamics, G. Berger, Royal Way, Scenarios, Vision, Options
VolitiveDynamic
Africa in 2nd Millenium
Insight
Africa in the XXth Century