IFA · International Foresight Academy
FP7 — People (Marie Curie Actions)
- Duration
- 2012-05-01 → 2015-04-30
- EU contribution
- €368,500
- Participants
- 7
- Scheme
- MC-IRSES
Lines connect the coordinator with its partners. CORDIS does not always give exact coordinates for projects before 2014. These points are placed at city or country level.
Results in brief
International Foresight Academy
The International Foresight Academy (IFA) was the first initiative worldwide to bring together foresight activities around the globe in order to expand horizons and offer new networking opportunities. This EU project, coordinated by the Austrian Institute of Technology, did not only use international exchange programmes and seminars to broaden perspectives of the participants and a larger audience, but it also examined how foresight can be used to organize participative process in modern democracies and how to use the “discipline of anticipation” in our daily strategic planning. Partners from a wide range of European (Austria, Finland, Romania, Switzerland) and non-European countries (Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Russia, South Korea) took part in this exchange scheme. The project focused on examining the extent to which foresight and anticipation could serve as an instrument to promote participative processes in different democracies. IFA also offered an exchange programme for scientist, two summer schools (near Vienna, Austria and in Brasília, Brazil) and two academic seminars (near Zürich, Switzerland and in Buenos Aires, Argentina). During the course of the project a range of secondments were realized, increasing the mutual understanding of Foresight in each of the participating countries. As action research, IFA explored and compared if and how foresight and anticipation comprise the potential to function as means in supporting to better face and influence politics, especially with regard to the Grand Challenges. IFA helpe dto strengthen and expand the Foresight world wide and stablished new productive relations between researchers, policy makers and "foresighters". For more information on IFA and the activities see also http://ifa.cgee.org.br/ .
Data: CORDIS, © European Union
Project objective
The proposed International Foresight Academy is the first organization to bind together Foresight activities around the globe and from contrasting cultural and political contexts. As the Mapping Report of the European Foresight Monitoring Network (2009) has documented, Foresight is used differently in various regions of the world. Foresight activities vary according to sponsors and customers, methods used, topics explored, actors involved etc. They vary also with regard to their functions in political strategy formulation of modern democracies.During the past 30 years in Europe, Foresight has become an unconventional means of political priority setting and strategic decision making that affect a wide set of societal stakeholders. The added value of foresight is seen in the shared goals and visions among a group of participating actors from different sectors, the development of networks, and the combination of relevant information on current trends and future developments with actor-based information and attitudes. Many foresight practitioners value the possibility granted by foresight exercises to bring topics on the political agenda that need to be discussed not behind closed doors but with broad public involvement.The proposal for the IFA consists two parts: a research part dedicated to the issue of FS as a format of participation in different democratic traditions; and a second part that manages the networking of the partners doing research on the FS field with regard to democracy and participation. The network will involve activities such as mutual exchange among the partners, summer/winter schools for early stage researchers, seminars and academic workshops. The outreach of some of these activities will address additional actors as well, e.g. stakeholders, organizers, practitioners of FS exchanging knowledge in the envisaged conferences.
Original text from CORDIS.
Participants
- AIT AUSTRIAN INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY GMBH · WienCoordinatorAustria
- INTERDISCIPLINARY CENTER FOR TECHNOLOGICAL ANALYSIS AND FORECASTING · RAMAT AVIV TEL AVIVCountry levelIsrael
- INTERNATIONALES INSTITUT FUER ANGEWANDTE SYSTEMANALYSE · LaxenburgAustria
- THE UNIVERSITY OF MANCHESTER · ManchesterUnited Kingdom
- TURUN YLIOPISTO · TurkuFinland
- UNITATEA EXECUTIVA PENTRU FINANTAREA INVATAMANTULUI SUPERIOR A CERCETARII DEZVOLTARII SI INOVARII · BucurestiRomania
- ZURCHER HOCHSCHULE FUR ANGEWANDTE WISSENSCHAFTEN · WinterthurSwitzerland
Links
Data: CORDIS, © European Union