Category: Uncategorized

In the latest instalment of my column for Information Professional, I interview Trish Hepworth, Director of Policy and Education at the Australian Library and Information Association, ALIA. You can find the column here and read the full conversation below.

MF: What was your journey to libraryland?

TH: I originally did a law degree. I was admitted as a practitioner to the Supreme Court of the Australian Capital Territory (ACT), was working as in-house counsel for a government department, and I fell into libraries by complete accident.

I joined the precursor to today’s Australian Libraries and Archives Copyright Coalition, who look after copyright policy and training for the entire library sector, and the Australian Digital Alliance, a cross-sectoral group advocating for fair copyright reform, with members ranging from libraries to tech companies, education institutions, and organisations like Vision Australia which support people in getting access to media and materials. These groups were looking at some of the fundamental values which hold the library sector together: equitable access to knowledge, information, and culture.

I found myself suddenly based at the National Library of Australia, in this wonderful institution, surrounded by amazing library and information professionals, delving deep into the intricacies of the copyright act. This is a confusing, often quite antiquated patchwork of legislation, which sometimes doesn’t even make sense; one of the greatest achievements in our copyright reforms has been that it’s no longer an offence to file document delivery request slips in chronological order!

We were looking at ways to make life easier for libraries and information services, when this act from 1968, which has since been amended in various ways, still doesn’t really sit very well with the changes which have been brought by digital. We faced, and still face, frustrating situations where there is an amazing wealth of archival materials, and no legal way to make these accessible to people. There are still obstacles, for example, to people accessing materials remotely – which, during a pandemic, has basically cut off access to huge swathes of knowledge and culture. Even when we’re not under conditions of COVD and lockdown, it still disproportionately favours people who live in large metropolitan centres and close proximity to the physical collections. Why should people who live in rural areas, or whose disabilities make travel difficult, be disadvantaged relative to people, say, who live in the centre of Melbourne? With all of the technologies and capabilities that we have, it’s slightly ridiculous that this is even an issue.

Dr. Peter Scoblic is a co-founder and principal of the strategic foresight consultancy Event Horizon Strategies. A former executive editor at The New Republic and Foreign Policy who has written on foresight for publications including the New York Times, The Washington Post, Science, and Harvard Business Review, Peter is also a senior fellow with the International Security Program at New America, and an instructor for the Professional Development Program at Harvard University. Previously, he was deputy staff director of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, where he worked on approval of the New START agreement and was the chief foreign policy speechwriter for Chairman John Kerry.

Peter joined me for a discussion about his career, ranging from post-Cold War nuclear arms policy to the relationship between policymaking and pop culture, plus the practical question of how and to what extent we can usefully predict the future. The interview will appear on this blog in three parts – you can read the first part here and the second here – but you can also read the interview in its entirety as a PDF download.

*

Sometimes, Peter, I wonder if scenarios are about the future at all. Josh Polchar at the OECD compares them to instructional fables; Pierre Wack said you spend only a little time talking about the future once you’ve built the scenarios, and you then focus on the implications of the present. 

Scenarios use the future as a convenient fictional setting in which to craft stories that will shine light on our strategic blindspots, but in some ways they might as well be set in parallel worlds.

Scenarios are essentially the crafting of fake analogies, what Herman Kahn called “ersatz experience”, so that when we encounter the novel or unexpected, we have something to compare it to, instead of flailing about in the moment.

Fiction needn’t be set in the future to convey experiences and situations that we haven’t had – or cannot have. Some fiction challenges us to consider: how would we respond in the situation faced by these characters? What if I found myself in this story?

Scenarios aren’t simply their own bubble universe, belonging only to specialist practitioners. We’re all engaged in scenario-making at various points in our lives. 

Dr. Peter Scoblic is a co-founder and principal of the strategic foresight consultancy Event Horizon Strategies. A former executive editor at The New Republic and Foreign Policy who has written on foresight for publications including the New York Times, The Washington Post, Science, and Harvard Business Review, Peter is also a senior fellow with the International Security Program at New America, and an instructor for the Professional Development Program at Harvard University. Previously, he was deputy staff director of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, where he worked on approval of the New START agreement and was the chief foreign policy speechwriter for Chairman John Kerry.

On the eve of a particularly fraught election and a turbulent moment in US political history, Peter joined me for a discussion about his career, ranging from post-Cold War nuclear arms policy to the relationship between policymaking and pop culture, plus the practical question of how and to what extent we can usefully predict the future. The interview will appear on this blog in three parts, and you can read the first part here – but you can also read the interview in its entirety as a PDF download.

*

Your doctoral research has led to a number of outputs, including a great research paper on strategic foresight as a dynamic capability in uncertain situations, and case study work on the US Coast Guard’s scenarios programme which can be explored in both an article and podcast for the Harvard Business Review.

Is there anything you uncovered in your doctoral research which hasn’t come up in coverage of your work?

Scenario planning can be used to challenge assumptions and the mental models people have of the world, but it also has its own models and assumptions baked into it: how time works, how the future relates to the present and past. 

One of the things I found interesting was that, among the Coast Guard for example, scenario participants found that the process didn’t just change their mental model of how the organization went about its mission and operations; it also changed the way they thought about time. 

Canada’s Rebecca Jones and Jane Dysart invited me to talk about strategy in times of uncertainty, and what 2020 might mean for information and heritage professionals, as part of their “Nexter” webinar series.

We got together online with an audience from across the timezones for a lively discussion.

Visit the Dysart & Jones website for more from the “Nexter” series.