Column by Pim Buijs
As I write this column, we are approaching 2025. The end of the year is a time for reflection, but also for looking ahead. I focus on the latter, as the theme of this edition of TOPOS is "futuristic landscapes." This subject brings to mind various associations of a bright future: flying cars, homes for everyone, AI-driven innovations, and so on. It also evokes images of the Das brothers, two illustrators, architects, and futurists. They created forward-looking designs for buildings and landscapes, using planet Earth as their starting point (see figure 1). As I observe this landscape, I hear the well-known song by John Lennon, Imagine:
Imagine there's no heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us, only sky
Imagine all the people
Livin' for today
Figure 1: Hill landscape by brothers Das (Source: http://www.rudolfdas.nl/)
Imagine is a famous song that paints a picture of a bright future. What fewer people know is that a well-known (and my favorite) band, Steely Dan, made a song in response to Imagine. The song is called Only a Fool Would Say That:
A world become one of salads and sun
Only a fool would say that
(….)
I heard it was you
Talking 'bout a world where all is free
It just couldn't be
And only a fool would say that
This song mocks John Lennon, calling him a fool for imagining a future that, according to Steely Dan, is completely disconnected from reality. Imagine is, literally and figuratively, ‘Toekomstmuziek’ (Dutch saying, literally translates to ‘music of the future’). A future that according to Donald Fagen and Walter Becker, the core members of the band, only fools talk about.
This musical contrast reflects my internal struggle when it comes to future visions. By nature, I'm a glass-half-full person, but I also recognize that our near future doesn't look that bright. In my columns, I've often discussed the numerous crises in the Netherlands and beyond: the housing crisis, the asylum crisis, the climate crisis, the biodiversity crisis, and so on. On top of that, there is the creeping shortage of basic necessities: in addition to the well-known housing crisis, we are also dealing with issues like network congestion and impending drinking water shortages. When I reflect on all the political promises made by various politicians in recent years, Steely Dan's song starts playing in my head.
The reality of this future quickly brings one to a melancholic state. What is often done to get out of this is to create a future vision by making grand promises and constructing even bigger, more compelling plans: faster procedures, fewer regulations, more building, less policy, fewer civil servants, and more focus on implementation, just to name a few. The complication with all of these crises is that they cause a great deal of uncertainty, and this uncertainty makes it incredibly difficult to make bold plans. Things need to happen, but I often feel that with these grand plans as solutions to the many crises, I can no longer see the forest for the trees. And there's that creeping feeling that if we do nothing, the whole forest will soon be burned down.
In this context, it helps me not to think about what the future landscape might look like, but to focus on what we need in order to form a future landscape. In my opinion, two aspects are incredibly important in a future where we can't even be sure of access to basic necessities: resilience and agility.
The difference between the two is explained as follows by Martijn van der Steen and Professor Mark van der Twist (2014):
Resilience refers to absorbing shocks, such as building buffers to absorb impacts (Wildavsky, 1984; Walker et al., 2004). The idea is that the problem can't be avoided, but the buffer provides space to deplete. Agility takes a different approach and focuses on the ability to quickly respond to an unexpected event and move around it (De Bruijne, Boin & Van Eeten, 2010; Huitema et al., 2010). So, not absorbing and depleting, but adapting and moving forward. Not absorbing the blow, but steering around it.
Whatever future landscape we imagine, the current complex reality requires that we take into account unexpected events. For example, the majority of the world was completely unprepared for COVID-19. It had disastrous consequences, but thanks to the resilience and agility of the Netherlands, the country didn't fall apart. Resilience manifests in the future landscape as soil and water management, emergency batteries, and contingency plans. Agility requires smart systems, the right steering information, and decisive action.
But agility primarily requires something from us as a society: getting used to the idea that the future is uncertain and that we can't take everything for granted. It also means getting used to the idea that we need each other to be agile. To bring back the COVID example, everyone found thousands of ways to keep their normal lives going as much as possible. It wasn't always pretty, but we helped each other get through it. I think we can all think of people who helped us during that strange COVID time. For future uncertainties, it's equally important that we remain connected and help each other in a compassionate yet pragmatic way. Perhaps I am a little naïve, but I believe that together, we can and must shape the future landscape according to these two principles. Steely Dan would probably call me a fool. Maybe I am a fool, but I am also a dreamer. In the words of Blondie: Dreamin' is free. And if there's one thing the Dutch love...
Sources:
Van Der Steen, M., & Van Twist, M. (2014). Weerbaar of wendbaar zijn? Strategische opties in de voorbereiding op de drie decentralisaties. Beleid En Maatschappij, 41(1), 58–64. https://doi.org/10.5553/benm/138900692014041001010
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