Looking to Finnish is only the start

LIKE Scotland, Finland is on the northern edge of Europe with a lot of trees and water but relatively few people.

Both countries live beside larger and more powerful neighbours, but they fight hard to maintain their own national identity. And both countries have a bit of a reputation for enjoying a drink.

Soon there may be another similarity - their political attitude to "the future". In 1993, the Finnish parliament set up a committee for the future which was intended to help the country emerge from a deep recession triggered by the collapse of the Soviet Union.

We know what happened next - Nokia transformed itself from a paper pulp company to a technology giant that put tiny mobile phones in pockets around the world. Finland has become a well-educated, technologically sophisticated country with a high standard of living and excellent public services. You decide whether any of that sounds like Scotland too.

Finland is still thought to be the only national parliament that has put the future permanently on the political agenda in this way. But in December, George Reid, the presiding officer, announced that he hoped to create a "futures forum" at the Scottish Parliament.

"We have to address the issues of how we build a sustainable society, comfortable with itself at home and confident of competing in the global marketplace," he said.

This sounds like a very Finnish vision of the future based on innovation and new technology.

We have heard a lot in Scotland too about the importance of "knowledge economy". A vision of clean, hi-tech industries replacing manufacturing has become the official story of Scotland’s future. Who would argue against more companies employing an educated workforce on decent money?

My question is whether it’s inspiring enough. The official view of Scotland is based on its economy rather than its people.

So should Scotland try to become more like Finland and grow its own Nokia? It probably wouldn’t hurt. But in truth, the Finns themselves are not particularly enthused by their parliament’s vision of the future, which is seen as too obsessed with technology. Like us, the Finns are more worried by social issues such as a declining population.

IT’S fortunate that George Reid appears to have rejected the Finnish model and is trying something different at Holyrood. There is talk of the importance of "participation" - or put simply, getting more people involved.

This has got to be the right approach. Throughout last year, I worked on a year-long project called Scotland 2020, which tried to create a "public conversation" about the future of our nation. My conclusion is this - thinking about the future is too important to be left to the experts.

With a futures forum at the parliament, Scotland has the opportunity to create something really new - a "future literate" nation. Futures literacy is ability to think imaginatively about the future. That’s not the same as predicting the future, which can’t be done, whatever anyone tells you. But by imagining some possible futures, it is easier to head in the direction of the one we like the most.

The trouble is that thinking about the future is difficult to do without resorting to sci-fi cliches, or just assuming that things will continue to get better (or worse). Drawing straight lines from today’s trends isn’t a reliable guide to tomorrow. Future literate people can think beyond these limited visions.

It may be that we have a bit of a blind spot when it comes to thinking about the future in Scotland. There is a fatalist streak in the Scottish character that tends to see events as unalterable and inevitable. Fatalism means feeling you don’t have any control over future events and reduces the motivation to act. That kind of attitude would obviously hinder attempts to create a better future.

Evidence for this fatalist streak is provided by Scotland’s poor public health record, largely resulting from smoking and bad diet. There are a lot of complicated reasons for this, and poverty is obviously a major factor. But at a personal level, smoking heavily or unhealthy eating can also be linked to a sense of fatalism. If you don’t see any possibility of a better tomorrow, self-destructive behaviour today is more likely. Creating opportunities for people to think about the future won’t guarantee a better future for individuals or Scotland as a whole, but it is a good start. Imagining a better future is surely a necessary first step in trying to create one.

In September, we ran an event called Nairn Day, at which more than 70 people spent a day thinking about the town they would like to live in the future. In many ways, their concerns were unremarkable - better transport links, tackling drugs, community safety. But the point was there was a real appetite and aptitude for talking about the future of their community.

I DOUBT that the people of Nairn are unique. My view is that, given the opportunity, lots of Scots would jump at the chance to imagine a better place to live and maybe even make a start on doing something about it.

That’s why a futures forum backed by the parliament could have such an important role in the emergence of a new, hopeful Scotland. The "official future" of Scotland has been designed and marketed by our national public bodies. We don’t need another one to do the same job.

Instead, the futures forum should be given a totally different task - to create opportunities for people around Scotland to imagine and discuss their own vision of the future.

The fact is a better Scotland can’t be designed and delivered by Holyrood, the Scottish Executive or any other national institution. They have an important role to play, of course, but real change will come from the people themselves. Imagining is the first step towards creating.

Eddie Gibb is co-editor of Scotland 2020: Hopeful Stories for a Northern Nation, published by Demos and the Scottish Book Trust. www.demos.co.uk