by We are probably never going to achieve utopia. What a negative, pessimistic thing to say! Have I turned sour on the future? Not at all. I’ve been wrestling with the challenge of how we can do a better job of suggesting positive futures. My work “After Capitalism” is grounded in that idea. Indeed, one of the books I reviewed for it was Utopia for Realists. It seems that positive futures are being equated with utopias. So let’s start there.
One of the reasons that utopias are dismissed is that they seem so at odds with the problems of the present day. Unrealistic, foolish, etc., etc. It is indeed hard to imagine a world where all problems are solved. That is actually quite a reasonable view. There is probably not a future where all problems are solved. It’s not a useful way to think of the concept. Utopia are a useful device for how things could be better in the future. Not perfect, but better.
Right now, I think a case could be made that we are living in a utopia from the vantage point of someone in the past. Go back a hundred or more years. Imagine someone in the 1800s being told of a future in which we could instantaneously communicate and see other people all around the world via a handheld device (smart phone). Magic, right? Or we’d be exploring outer space, have self-driving vehicles, or drone delivery. (I know, tech examples, but they are easiest to see). Life expectancy is double. Many previously fatal conditions have been cured. Access to education has greatly expanded. And so on. Again, compared to the distant past, this might seem like utopia. But from today’s point of view, there are still quite vexing problems!
So I think it’s helpful to think of utopia as a relative concept; a continuously evolving target that can help us imagine how the world might be better. Now for we futurists, substitute in “preferred future” for utopia. In working with groups, it is very common for people to see “preferred futures” as utopic, that is unrealistic and thus not worth paying attention to. Perhaps we could do a better job of noting that “there will still be problems in preferred futures aka utopias?” But hopefully, they are better problems.
There’s a lot more to unpack here. But starting with the idea of utopias as relativistic…..what do you think? – Andy Hines
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