Critical rationalism as a theoretical framework for futures studies and foresight

The aim of the present paper is to introduce a new philosophical perspective and methodological framework for Futures Studies (FS) and Foresight exercises. Following some introductory remarks concerning the status of FS as an academic discipline and the differences between science and technology (Section 2), in section three I introduce the perspective/framework of Critical Rationalism (CR) and the meta-method of Situational Analysis (SA). In section four I critically assess a number of popular methodological frameworks used in FS and Foresight practices. In the final section I briefly compare and contrast CR with the methodological frameworks introduced in the previous section.