Speculative Humanitarian Futures

Project undertaken in collaboration with Changeist for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC).

Three mini-scenarios designed to consider how trends and driving forces might impact society, humanitarian needs and the Red Cross mission in the year 2030. We imagined a confluence of situations, tools, actors and bureaucracies —and  used these to create detailed narratives with supporting artefacts representing our scenarios in a way that mixes the familiar with the uncanny.

This was a world in which the IFRC and similar organizations would face interconnected and complex challenges, including climate change, multipolar conflicts, grassroots technologies, and other discontinuities. Our selection of speculative artefacts and media explores this world through three scenarios: Protection (as examined in through “Temporary Dynamic E-Citizenship”), Consensus (which we look at through “Reality Collection”), and Participation (which we take on through “Haches Vertes”). The prototypes aren’t “solutions,” or proposals for working systems, but provocations meant to spark consideration of these issues as played out in co-existing “small worlds”.

Changeist report on Phase Change
IFRC – The Future is Now
Beyond Survival Kits: Humanitarian Aid Is Going Wireless, Communal, And Autonomous – FastCompany