Future

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One use of social change research is to use the data, research and theory to understand the future. These are a few sites relating to understanding the future.

Organizations

The Institute for the Future (IF) at Anne Arundel Community College seeks to be the local information and training source for information on the future.  
http://www.aacc.edu/future/default.cfm  
       They have a list of other futures organizations  http://www.aacc.edu/future/organizations.cfm   some of which are listed below.


The Institute for the Future (IFTF)  http://www.iftf.org/   is an independent nonprofit research group. We work with organizations of all kinds to help them make better, more informed decisions about the future.  (My link checker says this link doesn't work, but it does.)


The Centre for Future Studies   http://www.futurestudies.co.uk/


Copenhagen Institute for Futures Studies.   http://www.cifs.dk/


The Frederick S. Pardee Center for the Study of the Longer Range Future.   http://www.bu.edu/pardee/    for the study of longer range future. They have some interesting lectures (as videos).

The RAND Frederick S. Pardee Center for Longer Range Global Policy and the Future Human Condition   http://www.rand.org/international_programs/pardee/futures/   "The RAND Pardee Center pursues ambitious objectives: to improve our ability to think about the longer-range future--from 35 to as far as 200 years ahead--and to develop new methods of analyzing potential long-range, global effects of today's policy options in order to design sound policies that are sensitive to those effects."

Both of the above were made possible by funding from, well, Frederick S. Pardee. Strange coincidence, isn't it?


Future of Humanity Institute   http://www.fhi.ox.ac.uk/   "The Future of Humanity Institute aims to become humanity's best effort at understanding and evaluating its own long-term prospects."


Hawaii Research Center for Futures Studies (HRCFS)   http://www.futures.hawaii.edu/   "It serves as a futures research arm for public agencies, private groups, and individuals who require assistance in locating future-oriented information or experts."


The Millennium Project of the American Council for the United Nations University has this: GLOBAL FUTURES STUDIES & RESEARCH
http://www.acunu.org/


Prospective 2100   http://www.2100.org/   overview of the past century, prospects for the next.


World Future Society   http://www.wfs.org/    The World Future Society is an association of people interested in how social and technological developments are shaping the future. The Society strives to serve as a neutral clearinghouse for ideas about the future.


People

Roger Caldwell's class page for Anticipating the future   http://ag.arizona.edu/futures/   "This course is only available on-line for individual interaction and not as a formal course (I retired but continue to maintain the pages). This page includes links to class materials and activities for your own exploring."
Has some essays, descriptions of future studies, tutorials and also lists links.


Some Forecasts


United Nations Expert Meeting on World Population in 2300   http://www.un.org/esa/population/publications/longrange2/longrange2.htm   report and data from a 2003 meeting.  Also includes a report World Population Totals for 1980-2050

The UN also has a population prospects database   http://esa.un.org/unpp/   where you can select forecasts for world, regions, etc.


The International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA)  http://www.iiasa.ac.at/Research/POP/proj01/   Probabilistic Projections by 13 world regions, forecast period 2000-2100, 2001 Revision


Ten Trends Reshaping the Global Landscape   http://www.worldtrendsresearch.com/major-trends.php   by Van Wishard, World Trends Research


From the Director of National Intelligence  http://www.dni.gov/  

Global Trends 2025: A Transformed World   http://www.dni.gov/nic/NIC_2025_project.html    "projects the potential impacts of climate change, population growth, political re-shuffling and a host of other dynamic trends on the world of the near-future. The report aims to help leaders identify and understand the coming challenges and to steer toward positive solutions."

Mapping the Global Future  http://www.dni.gov/nic/NIC_2020_project.html   also from the National Intelligence Council, a continuation of previous studies, including these:

Global Trends 2010   http://www.dni.gov/nic/special_globaltrends2010.html

Global Trends 2015: A Dialogue About the Future With Nongovernment Experts   http://www.dni.gov/nic/NIC_globaltrend2015.html   discussing trends in conflict, democratization, economics, technology, other topics.

This council also prepared these reports, available here   http://www.dni.gov/nic/NIC_confreports.html
 Mapping the Future of the Middle East
Mapping Sub-Saharan Africa's Future


Research or essays on Forecasting


Shaping the Next One Hundred Years: New Methods for Quantitative, Long-Term Policy Analysis. Robert J. Lempert, Steven Popper, and Steven C. Bankes.    http://www.rand.org/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1626/index.html    From Rand, "New analytic methods, enabled by modern computers, transform our ability to reason about the future. The authors here demonstrate a quantitative approach to long-term policy analysis (LTPA)."


Nico Keilman   http://folk.uio.no/keilman/   has some publications about population forecasting.


Barry Hughes'  International Futures   http://www.ifs.du.edu/   has papers, reports, a forum, bunch of other stuff.


Revisiting Useful Approaches to Data-Rich Macroeconomic Forecasting   http://www.newyorkfed.org/research/staff_reports/sr327.html   May 2008  Number 327, Revised October 2008, Jan J. J. Groen and George Kapetanios



Principals of forecasting (more shorter term)


Forecasting Principles   http://www.forecastingprinciples.com/welcome.html   "The  Forecasting Principles  site seeks to summarize all useful knowledge about forecasting so that it can be used by researchers, practitioners, and educators."


Links


future studies & future conflict studies   http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/awc-futr.htm   from the Air War College




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last updated and checked 1/23/09


They are doing system upgrades the week of 3/23/09, I'll check again next week.
The Institute for the Future (IF) at Anne Arundel Community College seeks to be the local information and training source for information on the future.
http://www.aacc.edu/future/default.cfm
       They have a list of other futures organizations  http://www.aacc.edu/future/organizations.cfm   some of which are listed below.