Practical imagination

Creativity typically refers to applied problem-solving, often operationalized through practical techniques. It is possible to train creativity like a muscle—to generate novelty through recombination, transformation or adaptive iteration. Creativity thrives within constraint and is usually focused on producing outcomes. Imagination, however, is some... See more

Imagination, in this light, becomes a foundational asset—not just for speculative design or cultural expression, but for shaping the next generation of institutions and business models. It enables a shift from reactive, short-term thinking to proactive, regenerative strategies that can thrive in complexity and uncertainty. For entrepreneurs committ... See more

If the Enlightenment was a revolution in thinking, the survival of the human species may well depend on a revolution in imagination. This revolution would not center reason and mastery, but interdependence, care and the capacity to imagine otherwise. It would demand that we challenge what we think is possible, not through extrapolation, but through... See more

Practical imagination, then, is not a luxury. It is a cultural and political practice. It refuses the idea that the future is something to be predicted or owned. Instead, it understands the future as something to be imagined with others, through contradiction and against the assumptions of the present. This requires transforming how imagination is ... See more

Designers and strategists working toward preferable futures must recognize that technical forecasting and trend analysis are not enough. Imagination is what allows alternatives to emerge—alternatives that are often suppressed by dominant narratives of innovation, growth and inevitability. When imagination is reclaimed as a civic and political capac... See more

Contemporary scholars such as Sohail Inayatullah, Roberto Poli and Riel Miller emphasize the importance of futures literacy, which is the capacity to imagine, critique and reframe multiple futures. Futures literacy expands our ability to navigate uncertainty and enables people to generate new meanings rather than simply extrapolate from current tre... See more

In futures studies, imagination is often described as the precondition for anticipation: we can only shape futures we are able to imagine. Without imagination, we remain trapped within the constraints of the present, repeating and refining what already exists.

Reclaiming imagination from this epistemic capture means recognizing that other ways of imagining have existed all along: relational, embodied, collective, often rooted in resistance. Indigenous cosmologies, Black speculative traditions, feminist temporalities and minoritarian storytelling all offer ways of imagining that do not reproduce hierarchy... See more

At the same time, imagination must be decolonized. The dominant modes of imagining the future—technocratic, extractivist, growth-driven—are not universal. They are specific to white, masculine, WEIRD (Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, Democratic) subjectivities trained to equate imagination not only with control, scale and optimization, but ... See more