World Futures Day

Beginning on 2 December 2022, the celebration of World Futures Day will promote public awareness of the future, how it is used, and what role it plays in the present. Through active collaborations across the globe, World Futures Day will highlight the universality of human anticipatory activities, nurture collective intelligence processes, promote and increase the research of futures thinking and its application for different reasons, in different contexts.

UNESCO will use this opportunity to raise further awareness of its Futures Literacy program and will encourage the dissemination of futures literacy as a capability-based approach to development – a skill accessible to each and every individual. Finding and implementing more sustainable and participatory approaches to development in this decade will be key to ensure effective and inclusive decision-making worldwide.

Images of the future are a powerful force, influencing not only what we perceive and pay attention to in the world around us right now, but also shaping our hopes and fears. Perception precedes action, therefore understanding the sources of our images of the future is of great importance. The need for innovation and creativity to create hopeful images of the future that inspire us to take action has never been more evident. As we have all become aware, the fundamental disruptions of our social and economic systems by the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic have challenged how we imagine and anticipate the future. Shaped by warnings of catastrophic climate change, the intensification of exclusion and fragmentation, our images of the future appear bleak. Such realisations have bred broader interest in how we perceive the future and its impact on our present decision-making.

On 10 September 2021, the United Nations Secretary-General published the report “Our Common Agenda”, which underscored the urgency to secure a more sustainable future for all people and foster a culture of anticipation at all levels to secure the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

To promote inclusive and transdisciplinary discussions on futures, on 24 November 2021 UNESCO’s 41st General Conference unanimously decided to proclaim 2 December as World Futures Day.

"Futures Literacy has become an essential skill in the context of the unprecedented crisis we are confronting, and where we come to realize that the future of humankind will depend on the kind of decisions we take today. Using Futures Literacy, we can question the current way we explain the world, and the analytical choices we make. We can challenge our assumptions, move out from our comfort zone and expand our imagination."

— Gabriela Ramos, Assistant Director-General for Social and Human Sciences, UNESCO