by 
I’m working on the explanation of what’s to come for After Capitalism. As regular readers are aware by now, three clusters or themes have emerged from the review of the 50-ish new/next economy ideas. But what to call them? It seems that visions, images, or utopias could each fit.
So far I have been referring to them primarily as visions, in part because I’ve been using IFF’s Three Horizons Model, which refers to the concepts in Horizon 3 as visions.
At the same time, a key inspiration for doing this work building upon my longstanding interest in images of the future. One of my earliest papers on the future when I was an undergrad in the 1980s was an analysis of Polak’s Image of the Future. So to pay proper homage to this work, the three themes could rightfully be called images.
It would also be fair to say that my intention to uncover positive stories about the future could be utopias. Indeed, Polak talked about eschatological and utopic images of the future, the former brought about by God and the latter from man.
Given that they are the key focus of the after capitalism book, one ought to be precise in the terminology, right? It has turned out to be quite a challenging journey to determine if there is any useful difference between the three.
The dictionary doesn’t provide much help:
- Image: a mental representation; idea; conception.
- Vision: a vivid, imaginative conception or anticipation.
- Utopia: any visionary system of political or social perfection.
Where I have netted out, in terms of operational definitions for the project:
- Vision is a project crafted by a group for its particular future [intent is to achieve].
- Image is an aspirational view of the universal human future based on ideal values within a culture, [intent is to inspire to achieve].
- Utopia is probably the least “accurate” of the three as it crafts a specific story of a specific place.
My sense at this point is that images is perhaps the most accurate of the three. But this use of the term image is probably more well-known among futurists. Visions may have a bit more popular appeal? What do you think? Does anyone possess a nice clear distinction between vision and image that might help? I would be grateful for your help, and will acknowledge it in the book if I use it! – Andy Hines
I like image also because as you say it is “inspirational” and “aspirational.” In the past I would have picked vision but I think image is more of a meta perspective and thus more to my current preference to include room for the mystery in life to maneuver.
Good luck and best wishes.
Terry Collins