D2.1 Research Guidelines for Foresight and Trend Analysis

Futures involving human action are open as we have the ability to choose otherwise, at least to a certain extent. Furthermore, we have data from the past but nothing from the future. Theory of the future does not exist either. Many theories and models we use to describe and understand the past may or may not be valid in specific futures. For these reasons, academic futures research as an activity is comprised of planning, design and evaluation of alternative futures rather than forecasting or crafting one future.