A friend and colleague Jake Dunagan (@dunagan23) started an important initiative at the Institute for the Future called the Governance Futures Lab. I gave a lightning talk at the launch event (The Reconstitution Convention) about how we use foresight in the UAE.  It covers a bit of the history of the UAE and Dubai, about futures consciousness in the government, and how we’re testing out new techniques like crowdsourcing to engage the future (see a summary of the Connected Citizens game or contact me if you want a copy of the report). It was an amazing event with some incredible conversations and interaction. I recommend checking out the other lightning talks (here), but some of my favourites are:

• Stuart Candy on “Futures, the Scaffolding of Imagination“
• Jordan Greenhall on “Complexity in Governance“
• Stephen Duncombe on “Depths of Distrust: Lessons from Occupy Wall Street“
• Jamais Cascio on “Hacking the Earth“
• Aaron Maniam on “Governance and the Challenge of Containing Multitudes“

For anyone ever considering putting on a similar event, lightning talks are a brilliant way to kick it off.  It sure beats most boring conferences.  40 five minute keynotes in the first three hours trumps 3 long  ones almost any day.]]>