is not just an organization, it is an engagement and consensus building process to help identify issues of concern to Hong Kong and help formulate workable public policies to address them. There is a need for such a project because it was felt that in terms of policy development, Hong Kong seems to have lost the ability to engage stakeholders at an early stage, and that policy makers seem to lack both the conviction of the importance to gather and build consensus and the requisite political skills to do so.

Hong Kong Foresight Centre is not just a think tank but provides a space to bring together various think tanks and relevant parties and to engage them in helping to provide idea generation and research support in the early stages of policy formulation, from this point of view, Hong Kong Foresight Centre is also a platform and a do tank.

The genesis of the project is rooted in our shared love for Hong Kong, the desire to create a more well-functioning society and the motivation to make policies more effective. The following Mission Statement might be a good way to describe the project at a more practical level:

Spaces for Fresh Thinking and Knowledge Creation

An event organised by the Hong Kong Foresight Centre and Fuji Xerox/KDI Hong Kong and Tokyo

Traditional office buildings with cubicles, low ceilings, loud air-conditioners and little natural light are not good for tasks that require thinking, communication and creativity. Architecture and design has a stronger influence on our thoughts and moods than most of us would assume.[i] How can we build spaces for people working with ideas?

Future Centres, Innovation labs or Future Workshops are terms to describe a space designed to support knowledge-creation. The spatial dimension includes conceptual, personal and social aspects. The core idea of future-directed spaces is based on the assumption that knowledge needs a physical context to be created.

The knowledge-creating process is context-specific in terms of time, space, and relationship with others. (Takeuchi, 2004, 101 ff)[ii] While the relationship between knowledge and space can be traced back to Greek philosophy (e.g. Aristotle’s idea of topos), the discussion on innovation spaces in public and private organisations has its roots in workspace planning and architecture, organizational behaviour, communication and knowledge management. (Ward 2003)[iii] Well designed spaces can produce powerful learning environments; “at their best, such design reflects the social character of work – the way in which people act as resources for one another, rather just as one another’s information provider”. (Brown, Duguid 2000)[iv]

Open Space session at Wikisym 2010 in Gdansk

Apart from design, the focus on dialogue and conversation to create a shared context is a common feature of future-oriented spaces. Even though the best insights and ideas are created in serendipitous, personal and private conversations, new ideas also need reflection and exposure in the community. This is the starting point for designing spaces for collaborative innovation.

According to Dvir (2009)[v] a “Future Center is made of a set of interlinked building blocks: a clear vision (why and for what for it is set up), a portfolio of services that translate this vision into value to the founding organization and wider community, a dedicated team of innovation facilitators, a core process for looking into the future and then addressing it in a practical way, a toolbox of innovation and futurizing methods, a sustainable business model, an attractive physical space that enables different kind of thinking and collaboration, a virtual environment that complement the physical one and a clever organizational positioning.”

A predecessor to the Future Centres which were set up in Europe since the mid-nineties following a European Commission funded project called “Open Futures” (2006-2008), are the so-called “Future Workshops”, based on a future technique developed by Robert Jungk in the 1970s. Future Workshops has been widely used to involved citizens in planning processes and are often used in public sector innovation projects. [vi]

The European “Open Futures” assume different forms in different organisations. There are varieties operating at the moment in public administration, in geographical regions, and in multinational industries. What unites them is a common focus on dealing with real people and real issues in organisations. They are centres for facilitated problem-solving, where people looking for real-time answers, new ideas and new directions, can bring their issues, problems, and questions. They feed and facilitate the decision-making process in organisations, whereby the output of working sessions, which – depending on what is relevant – can be as diverse as:

• decisions about strategic choices and ‘The way forward’, and/or
• physical prototypes of promising policy options, new products and services, and/or
• an enhanced sense of mutual respect, understanding and trust amongst collaborating partners or session participants[vii]

Based on this understanding of Future Centres/Spaces, the Hong Kong Foresight Centre works with organisations in the public and private sector to jointly explore issues relating to the future of Hong Kong’s socio-economic development. We want to create thinking and collaboration space to develop actionable ideas and prototypes, and reduce the time span from idea to action: that’s why we prefer to call our organisation a “do-tank”.

Author: Waltraut Ritter, Councillor, Hong Kong Foresight Centre, May 2011

Seminar and Panel Discussion

Date : 7 June 2008 (Saturday), 09:30-12:00p.m.
Venue : Poon Kam Kai Institute of Management at the HKU Town Centre
3/F, Tower II, Admiralty Centre, 18 Harcourt Road Hong Kong
9.30-9.45 Welcome & Introduction

9.45-10.30 Keynote: Humanity at the Crossroads

10.30-11.00 Tea/Coffee Break
11.00-11.50 Panel Discussion (with audience participation)
Dr. Ian Goldin
Prof. Joseph Chan, Director, Centre for Civil Society and Governance, University of Hong Kong and lead author
of “From Consultation to Civic Engagement, The Road to Better Policy-making and Governance in Hong Kong”
Mrs. Rachel Cartland, Director, Cartland Consulting Limited
Mr. Laurence Li, The 30s Group
Patrick Cheung
George Cautherley, Professional Commons
Panel discussion moderated by Waltraut Ritter, Research Director, Knowledge Enterprises
11:50-12:00 Closing Remarks and Next Steps