Business’ Role in Creating Better Futures
I’ve been reading a fascinating (if sometimes dry and academic) book by James Ogilvy, one of the premiere scenario planners, called Creating Better Futures.
I put off reading this book for quite sometime, since one of the primary tenets of scenario planning is that the axes you use for creating scenarios shouldn’t be cast in terms of “good” at one end and “bad” at the other, and the title of Ogilvy’s book made me fear his use of the word “better” meant he had slipped into some kind utopian forecasting towards the end of his career. Thankfully this turned out not to be the case.
The axes of any scenario project essentially create the frame through which those engaged in the exercise come to see the multiplicity of options before them. If some—not all, and certainly not just one—come to see a particular outcome or set of outcomes as “better” or more desirable than the others, there are always things we can do to influence or shape what the future will be, even if we can’t control or dictate it.
One of Ogilvy’s more interesting arguments is that we are entering a third shift in terms of the locus of power and control in our society, one which needs to be kept in mind as we frame the various issues before us.
Briefly, we’ve moved from a theocentric world (he is speaking primarily and in general terms about western civilization) in which religion ruled supreme, and everyone’s place and role in society was defined by the church as the guardian of things religious.
Gradually, the political sphere took center stage, nudging both religion and the church out of the spotlight (most prominently here in America, where we went so far as to establish a clear separation between the two). Religion did not, has not, and will not go away, but it is no longer the seat of power and authority when it comes to law, policy, and the governing of society.
Ogilvy argues that economics—and by proxy, business—is now beginning to displace government from the spotlight. Again, this does not mean government as we know it will go away, only that increasingly economics and business will be in the driver’s seat.
Now some will say this has already happened and government today is nothing more than “the hand puppet of Big Business.” There are, of course, many situations you could point to in order to make that case. There are equally as many to point to that “prove” the opposite. But it is exactly this kind of “good vs. bad” framing that clouds the issue. The real issue needs to be framed around what the potential roles for business might be in a variety of possible futures where this shift occurs.
Lars Josefsson, CEO of Vattenfall, Sweden’s state owned power monopoly, might just be the poster child for one possible scenario that could actually lead to a “better” future. The Financial Times calls Josefsson “Europe’s climate change convert.” Others refer to him as Europe’s Al Gore, a label that Josefsson rejects. “The inconvenient truth,” he suggests, “has a convenient solution.”
Josefsson believes the emphasis on individual carbon footprints is misplaced and could well do more harm than good in the long run. “[One of the risks is] people get tired of it, and the second is that it has very little to do with the solution to the problem. It paints the wrong picture to the public and can cause very negative reaction.”
Instead Josefsson argues that “an issue of outstanding importance is the future role of the international business community. Up to now, business leaders have made a strategic mistake by letting politicians and NGOs handle the challenge mainly on their own.
“It is high time for the international business community to rethink the entire climate change issue, it must play a central and active role in setting up the basic rules and regulations….In my view, business is more globalized than policy. Business and markets can deliver. Business and markets can solve climate change easier, but politics has to deliver the framework of incentives to give business the possibility to do it.”
Regardless of what your biases may be going into the discussion, Josefsson’s challenge seems worthy enough to warrant suspending any disbelief long enough to examine what possible business-led scenarios might look like, and how they might, in Ogilvy’s terms, lead us to “creating better futures.” And there are at least two more books I have to add to my reading list now, both by Lars Josefsson: “Curbing Climate Change” and “The Future in Our Hands”—at least, once they are available in the US…