This book presents fresh ways of thinking about the future for all those involved in conceiving, planning, designing, funding, constructing, occupying and managing the built environment, to face the challenges, and grasp the opportunities, that lie ahead over the next few decades. Four major themes form the basis of the volume:
(1) Future Awareness and a New Sense of Place.
(2) Global Governance and Anticipatory Leadership.
(3) Innovation, Reform and Exemplars.
(4) Urban Planning and Real Estate Transformations.
Within these structural themes are a diverse range of 'Discourses' addressing many of the big questions and driving forces that face us, together with a proposed methodology (Strategic Foresight) and an array of practical illustrations viewing what can be done today - whether by organisations, individuals, cities or communities - to positively shape a preferred future and manipulate us towards achieving it. It will be important reading for students, practitioners, agencies and corporations across the built environment, especially in the fields of urban planning, real estate development, architecture, civil engineering and construction.
About the Author: John Ratcliffe is Professor Emeritus at Dublin University of Technology. He practised as a chartered planning and development consultant for many years. John is now a Strategic Foresight consultant for the built environment.
Michael Stubbs is a member of the Royal Town Planning Institute and Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors. He specialises in planning work and is a visiting tutor at the Bartlett School of Planning, University College London.
