Generations in Dialogue
about the Future:
The hopes and fears
of young Australians
Richard Eckersley,
Helen Cahill, Ani Wierenga and Johanna Wyn
with contributions from
Michael Waugh,
Dan Woodman,
Julian Waters-Lynch,
Janet McCalman,
and Jennifer Gidley
and
five students from a Melbourne High School
April 2007
A project by Australia 21 Ltd
and the Australian Youth Research Centre,
funded by The University of Melbourne
First published April 2007 by the Australian Youth Research Centre and Australia 21
ISBN 978 0 7340 3740 4
Electronic version available at:
www.australia21.org.au
Contact details:
Australia 21 Ltd
PO Box 3244
Weston ACT 2611
Phone:
Email:
Web:
+61 2 6288 0823
office@australia21.org.au
www.australia21.org.au
Australian Youth Research Centre
Faculty of Education
University of Melbourne VIC 3010
Phone:
Fax:
Email:
Web:
©
+61 3 8344 9633
+61 3 8344 9632
yrc@edfac,unimelb.edu.au
www.edfac.unimelb.edu.au/yrc/
Australia 21 Ltd and Australian Youth Research Centre
All rights reserved. No part of this report may be reproduced or utilised in any form or by any means,
electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval
system, without permission in writing from Australia 21 Ltd and the Australian Youth Research Centre.
The views expressed in this paper are those of the authors and are not necessarily those of Australia 21
Ltd, the Australian Youth Research Centre, the Faculty of Education or The University of Melbourne.
2
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
Table of Contents
Executive Summary
Introduction
Pathways to the preferred futures of young Australians
Our approach to this report
Future and narrative studies
Future visions and wellbeing
Futures polls: losing faith in the official future?
Youth Futures Consultation Day
The workshop story
5
11
11
12
13
16
17
21
21
Different Voices and Stories
31
Doug’s Reflection
Michael’s Story
Bill’s Reflection
Dan’s Story
Julian’s Story
Ani’s Story
John’s reflection
Richard’s Story
Dave’s reflection
Janet’s Story
Jane’s reflection
Jennifer’s Story
31
31
34
35
38
40
43
44
46
47
49
50
Implications
Policy Implications
Research
References
The hopes and fears of young Australians
53
54
57
59
3
Acknowledgements
he authors gratefully acknowledge the contributions of the
following people to this project:
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
he 21 young people involved in this project
Staff and Students at ‘Seaside’ High School
David Newman
Kate Donelan
All others on the Research Panel
Ipsos Mackay Research
Glyn Davis, Vice Chancellor, he University of
Melbourne
We also wish to thank Helen Stokes and Julie Marr at the
Australian Youth Research Centre for administrative and
managerial support.
4
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
Executive Summary
his project aims to improve the
understanding of young people’s sense
of what the future holds for them. An
innovative approach was designed specifically
to open dialogue across traditional
disciplinary and age boundaries and to
bridge the gap between the agendas and
preoccupations of academics and policymakers and those of young people.
he project suggests that:
•
young people value the opportunity to
discuss the future with each other and
with adults;
•
they need to be given more of these
opportunities, including in schools,
families and communities, as part of
making sense and meaning of the world
and their lives; and
•
they deserve a greater voice on matters of
most concern to them.
Creating more spaces for dialogue would
increase their engagement and capacity to act
in the face of daunting challenges.
he project is the second within a research
program, Australians in society, initiated by
Australia 21, a non-profit, public-interest
research company. he first project, Pathways
to success and wellbeing for Australia’s young
people, sought to identify ways to help
young people to optimise their wellbeing
and to realise their full potential against a
background of often adverse trends in their
physical and mental health and wellbeing.
The hopes and fears of young Australians
his project takes up themes discussed in
the first project: the importance of cultural
‘intangibles’ to wellbeing, and the role of
narrative in their lives. Like the first project,
this project has the Australian Youth
Research Centre as a collaborator. Funding
came from he University of Melbourne.
Project aim and structure
he project aims to further the
understanding of young people’s views of
the future and how these views are woven
into the stories they create to make sense
and meaning of their lives. his integration
matters not only to young people themselves
(by enhancing their sense of belonging,
identity and control over their lives, for
example), but also to Australian society (by
engaging young people in the shared task of
building a better future for the nation and
the planet).
hus, while the project is focused on young
people’s future visions, this focus is also a
vehicle for exploring broader questions of
identity, belonging, meaning and values.
heir stories about the future allow the
exploration of qualities that research has
traditionally examined through objective
parameters such as education and labourforce participation, marriage and parenthood.
5
he project includes several elements:
•
a workshop using ‘role-based enquiry’, a
drama technique that allowed students
from a Melbourne high school to create,
show, narrate and interpret their views of
the future;
•
a research panel (from futures studies,
youth studies, education, psychology,
history and drama) who also participated
in the workshop;
•
literature reviews; and
•
surveys of young people’s attitudes to
trends in quality of life, the future of
Australia and the world, and the impacts
of science and technology.
hus the project marries the sciences with
the humanities and the arts, and quantitative
with qualitative approaches.
his report describes the project activities
and offers options for further development
of the project. he report is presented in a
way that gives the reader the opportunity to
access the nature of the dialogue between
adults from different academic disciplines
and young people about young people’s
futures.
Rather than wash out the different points
of view through the production of a
synthesis, the report presents these different
perspectives in the words of the different
authors. here are many points of agreement
woven through these narratives, and there are
differences of interpretation by participants
on key issues. his mode of presentation
enables us to maintain integrity with the
methodology employed in the project.
The context
Futures studies reveal the different ways
in which researchers have approached the
future and in which people construe the
future. hey note the human susceptibility
to Apocalyptic ideas and, at the same time,
the mythic need for Utopian ideals, both of
which are embodied in stories. Narrative
6
studies have demonstrated the power of
stories to transport ideas across time and
space, construct meaning and identity, shape
communities, enrich social life, define social
issues, and even put together shattered lives.
Young people’s concerns about the future
of the world and humanity matter. he
erosion of faith in society and its future
influences the way people see their roles and
responsibilities, and their relationship to
social institutions, especially government.
It denies them a social ideal to believe in
and a wider framework of meaning in their
lives, so increasing the psychological ‘load’ on
personal expectations.
his issue has taken on added urgency
because people’s perceptions of the future
are increasingly shaped by the images of
global or distant threat and disaster to which
they are exposed: earthquakes, hurricanes,
floods, disease pandemics, terrorist attacks,
genocide, and famine. While these hazards
are not new, previous fears were never so
sustained and varied, nor so powerfully
reinforced by the frequency, immediacy and
vividness of today’s media images. his effect
seems certain to intensify as global warming
and other threats begin to impact more
deeply on people’s lives.
The polls
he project includes a quantitative
component to assess the attitudes of young
Australians to personal, national and global
futures and if these attitudes have changed
over time. hese surveys also explore
more specific questions about science and
technology and their impacts. his part of
the project provides a broader context to
the qualitative research, a less rich but more
representative picture of young people’s
views.
Most young Australians are personally
optimistic about their own lives, but a
growing proportion appears to believe
quality of life is declining, despite a long
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
economic boom that has seen sustained,
strong economic growth, declining
unemployment and rising incomes. he gap
between their expected and preferred futures
for Australia has widened, and concerns
about the future of the world have increased.
hey would like to be heard by older people,
but they also want to hear what older people
think. his raises a critical question: how
does society generally provide the spaces
within which young and older people can
engage in meaningful dialogue?
he results suggest a deepening rift between
political action, with its focus on economic
indicators, and public opinion about quality
of life. hey point to growing loss of faith
in a future constructed around notions of
material progress, economic growth and
scientific and technological fixes to the
challenges of this century. Many young
people (and older) no longer believe in
the ‘official story’ of the future on which
governments base their policies.
he project has significant messages for
those involved in the development and
implementation of youth policy, across all
jurisdictions, for the private sector and for
research. In particular, the young people
revealed that they:
•
Have a strong sense of personal
responsibility for building positive
futures, for themselves and their society.
hey have concerns about both personal
issues (for example, getting a good
job or doing well in their studies) and
about community and global issues (for
example, poverty, the environment and
terrorism), but feel relatively helpless
to address the ‘big picture’ issues and
disempowered beyond individual
responses.
•
Enjoy sharing and creating stories
from their own experience and hearing
those passed on through family and
community. Stories about overcoming
adversity and about hope for the future
are an important resource on which they
draw in solving their own problems and
in understanding how to take action.
•
Find that a sense of agency, commitment
and hope is generated when they engage
in dialogue across the boundaries of age
groupings, location and expertise.
The workshop
he responses of the young people who
participated in the workshop are consistent
with other research that suggests that young
people are growing up in a context that
individualises responsibility, but offers few
clear answers to the ‘big picture’ challenges.
hey were interested in taking an active
role in building a sustainable future, both
environmentally and socially, yet most found
it very difficult to name ways in which
they could personally contribute to a wider
agenda of constructing preferred futures and
actively link the personal to the local to the
global.
he workshop highlights the importance
of developing processes that enable crossdisciplinary and inter-generational dialogue
in a structured way that promotes active
listening, the recognition of shared concerns
and collective responsibility for developing
solutions. It demonstrates that these
structured processes can lead to hope, a sense
of possibility, and an interest in taking action.
Young people’s reflections indicate that they
particularly value the opportunity to engage
seriously with older people about ethical,
social, political and environmental issues.
The hopes and fears of young Australians
he project highlights the responsibility that
older people have to value dialogue with
young people as a two-way process, listening
to their views, providing young people with
responses to their questions and showing an
interest in jointly exploring answers in a time
and place that is relevant to young people.
Many jurisdictions have responsibility for
different aspects of young people’s lives. In
7
terms of policy and governance, the trinity
of education, health and juvenile justice are
recognised as the dominant areas in which
policies and programs are developed and
enacted in young people’s present interests,
and on behalf of their future lives.
he project indicates that attention should
also be given to environmental policy as an
arena of particular significance to young
people’s futures. In practice, the environment
is rarely considered in relation to youth
health, education or employment. More
attention also needs to be paid to the role of
the media in shaping young people’s views of
the world and its future and, more broadly,
their own lives and priorities.
hrough its focus on futures, the project
provides an approach towards a more
coherent view of the role of policy in
informing structural responses to shared
problems. It also underlines the importance
of giving greater priority to involving young
people in policy-shaping processes.
8
he project shows that youth participation
in research is a realistic and effective
concept, but requires a shift away from
traditional, adult-centred approaches; and
that narratives and storying provide a useful
tool for understanding current situations,
for envisaging preferred directions, and for
generating a sense of how to achieve change.
Further research is warranted to extend this
project. he research methodology should
be deployed within the framework of a
larger, systematic research program involving
workshops with diverse groups of young
people, adults and ‘experts’. he purpose of
this would be to build a more systematic
picture of how different communities can
create visions of the future and build more
effective pathways towards those futures.
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
Personal perspectives
One thing that was clear to me by the
end of the day was that the experience
of cross-generational dialogue, and the
use of playful, interactive and inclusive
forms to explore issues, had created an
atmosphere of community, of care, and
of personal and shared accountability for
the future ... the research process not only
provided a useful tool for understanding
youth perspectives on personal and
global futures, but also became a forum
through which participants could create
a sense of possibility about making a
difference in the world and begin to
rehearse for action.
Helen Cahill
I’m left wondering whether these students
would be better equipped to embody a
future of power and control if that sense
of agency was a real part of their current
experiences: what if the voices of now
spoke to young people about being able
to take meaningful action? This question
provides my challenge and duty to
represent these young people back at
school, beyond the responsibility of that
workshop day.
Michael Waugh
Some of the stories that allowed social
action to take place in the past were
simple linear stories that proposed one
major problem, with one major cause (or
scapegoat) and one major path of action
... The young people I worked with during
The hopes and fears of young Australians
the workshop seemed neither willing, nor
able, to believe in these closed stories.
This might make social action harder,
but it allows space for newer ... and more
open narratives of social action to emerge,
stories that allow engagement with a
complex world ... I believe an important
task for youth research is to be open
for, and supportive of, these new stories
of action and engagement emerging
amongst young people.
Dan Woodman
In the discussion I considered the
difference between my experience as a
26 year old, and many of these 15 year
olds ... It is easy to over-estimate the
role of political leadership. However I do
think the rhetoric around vision for the
future at the time of the Hawke/Keating
government left a mark on me. I distinctly
remember debate around Australia’s
future as a multicultural republic at a time
when I was just awakening to the effect of
macro-political and cultural forces on my
life. I think in part the genius of Howard’s
political success has been a mastery of
reserve in ‘big picture’ vision and radical
changes. It seems that he has championed
the cause and legitimacy of everyday
Australian mums and dads, going about
their everyday affairs ... I think the political
context of their experience is easy for
many older people, even myself, to forget.
Julian Waters-Lynch
9
It has been interesting to reflect on the
workshop as a process of interruption.
Perhaps what workshop participants
were doing together, for a brief moment,
was interrupting some of the forces
that individualise and dehumanise, and
that render people isolated or helpless
to act and create change. So the young
people identified the importance of
respectful conversation about the future,
being heard, adult listeners, witnesses,
co-learners, safe spaces to speak, and
opportunities to hear each other. They
pointed to a sense of collectivity which led
to a sense of hope. They also highlighted
that these things were a departure from
their everyday experiences.
Ani Wierenga
Society needs to consider to what
extent family life (with its work-life
pressures, structured activities and
media distractions), education (with its
curriculum demands), friendships (with
a focus around entertainment), and the
media (increasingly intrusive) are no longer
allowing the time for the reflection and
conversations needed for creating stories.
Young people are, of course, exposed to
huge numbers of stories, some of which
reflect ages-old themes and myths.
However, to a large extent, they do not
inhabit these stories. However much they
might identify with the characters, these
are not personal narratives that provide
storylines connecting them to the wider
world and the future.
Richard Eckersley
10
You cannot develop a map for the future
unless you have some knowledge and
perspective on how human beings
have put the world together in the
past ... As a private individual, the past
gives me hope for the future in that it
reinforces my faith in the capacity of
ordinary people to strive for decency and
fairness in the world and to utilise new
knowledge to solve problems. Life goes
on, in spite of the most terrible events
and transformations. And young people
need to be given that hope that within
ourselves we can make history even
though the circumstances are never of
our own choosing.
Janet McCalman
One of the most outstanding aspects
of the ... workshop for me was the way
that the young people were able to relax
and open up because they felt that it
was a safe, enabling environment. The
intention and ability of all participants to
let their traditional ‘boundaries’ become
permeable enabled a high level of
cross-disciplinary and cross-generational
interaction. In these times of so much
complexity, and conflict, new methods of
breaking down barriers are so vital.
Jennifer Gidley
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
Introduction
Pathways to the preferred futures
of young Australians
One of the most complex and least
understood dimensions of the challenges
facing Australia is how people affect, and are
affected by, the processes of economic, social,
environmental and cultural change. his is
the realm of the subjective – of perceptions,
expectations and emotions – with which
research often struggles, yet which is so
important to how Australia shapes its future.
he interactions between this ‘inner world’
and the ‘outer world’ are the subject of
Australia 21’s Program One. Our initial focus
has been on young people, who best reflect
the tenor and tempo of the times and have
the biggest stake in how the future plays
out. he first project under the program,
Pathways to success and wellbeing for Australia’s
young people, aimed to identify ways to help
young people to optimise their wellbeing
and to realise their full potential against a
background of often adverse trends in their
physical and mental health and wellbeing.
hat project, carried out in collaboration
with the Australian Youth Research Centre
and funded by VicHealth, is now finished,
with the final report being published
in March 2006. he report (Eckersley,
Wierenga & Wyn 2006a) is available from
the Australia 21 website (www.australia21.
org.au). Papers drawing on the report have
been published in he Medical Journal
of Australia and Youth Studies Australia
(Eckersley, Wierenga & Wyn 2005, 2006b).
The hopes and fears of young Australians
he project involved a process of
transdisciplinary synthesis and sought
a better understanding of the points
of convergence and divergence in the
commentaries and evidence relating to
young people’s wellbeing. It proved far
from straightforward. Without the funds
to buy researchers’ time and services, some
participants withdrew from the project
or were unable to deliver agreed work.
Perspectives differed among different
disciplines and between quantitative and
qualitative researchers.
Even the authors of the report could not
agree on several key issues concerning young
people’s wellbeing, including: whether
trends in wellbeing can be generalised; the
extent to which different measures and
findings can be explained and reconciled;
the relative importance of social influences
and individual capacities in determining
wellbeing; the relative influences of
biological and social factors in young people’s
development; and whether potential and
wellbeing are separate and distinct.
he project went beyond the orthodox
scientific emphasis on structural changes in
the economy, labour market, education and
family in considering young people’s health
and wellbeing. It suggested a need for a
greater focus in both research and policy on
the following issues: the ‘big picture’ of the
broad social changes reshaping life today;
holistic approaches to health and wellbeing
(rather than just a focus on ill health); a
whole of population approach (rather than
11
just a concern with the marginalised and
at-risk); and consideration of the social and
cultural resources, as well as the material and
economic, that impact on wellbeing.
hese issues reflect the need to: acknowledge
that broad social changes do not ‘just happen’,
but flow from the choices people make,
individually and collectively; question the
often-assumed links between means and
ends that underpin these changes; give
communities space for conversations about
things of value; and allow time for reflection,
for asking questions as well as seeking
solutions.
he second project within Program One,
Pathways to the preferred futures of young
Australians, takes up themes discussed in
the first project: the importance of cultural
‘intangibles’ to wellbeing (especially how
young people see the future), and the role of
narrative in their lives. his project also has
the Australian Youth Research Centre as a
collaborator, with funding coming from he
University of Melbourne.
he project aims to further the
understanding of young people’s views of the
future and how these views are woven into
the stories young people create to make sense
and meaning of their lives. his integration
matters not only to young people themselves
(by enhancing their sense of belonging,
identity and control over their lives, for
example), but also to Australian society (by
engaging young people in the shared task of
building a better future for the nation and
the planet).
he project includes several elements: a
literature survey; a workshop using ‘rolebased enquiry’, a drama technique that
allowed young people to create, show, narrate
and interpret their views of the future; a
‘network’ of informed commentators (from
futures studies, youth studies, education,
psychology, history and drama) who
played an important but contained role in
witnessing and engaging with the youth
12
participants; and surveys by Ipsos Mackay
Public Affairs of attitudes to trends in
quality of life, the future of Australia and
the world, and the impacts of science and
technology. hus the project marries the
sciences with the humanities and the arts,
quantitative with qualitative approaches.
Our approach to this report
his monograph reports on the project
activities and offers options for further
development of the project. In keeping with
the underlying principles that guided the
design of the project, our report is presented
in a way that maximises the opportunity
for the reader to access the nature of the
dialogue between adults from different
academic disciplines and young people about
young people’s futures. As the purpose of this
project was to trial an innovative approach to
producing knowledge about young people’s
futures, our intention is to explore the
possibilities in this methodology, which is
described below.
Rather than wash out the different points of
view through the production of a synthesis,
we have chosen to present these different
perspectives in the words of the different
authors. hese narratives provide a record
of the data generated by the project in the
form of reflections on the workshop day from
most of the research panel and several of the
students. here are many points of agreement
woven through these narratives, and there are
differences of interpretation by participants
on key issues, such as the most appropriate
solutions or ways ahead. his mode of
presentation enables us to maintain integrity
with the methodology employed in the project.
he narratives are framed at the start of the
document by a brief summary of literature
on future and narrative studies and the
results of quantitative surveys of young
people’s attitudes to the future. Following the
narratives, the report contains an analysis
of the implications of the findings for policy
and for future research.
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
Future and narrative studies
his section provides an overview of research
into the role and importance of future visions
and narrative in people’s lives. It draws
attention to the convergence and synergy
between the two fields.
Future studies
Futures studies has existed as an academic
discipline for over forty years. Over that time
it has progressed through several phases or
approaches. According to Slaughter (2006),
for the first two or three decades, futures
studies was preoccupied with the external
world – tracking empirically verifiable
changes and trends in the world to produce
forecasts and trend charts; it was about
trying ‘to get the future right’.
here was then a shift into the use of
scenarios to explore divergence in this
forward view. Both these approaches
overlooked the grounding of all such work
in social and human factors, Slaughter says.
he third approach, critical futures studies,
brought into play the underlying issues of
social construction, and how all societies
use processes of legitimisation to maintain
themselves.
Finally, there is integral futures, which,
Slaughter says, has achieved two further
advances: revealing the importance of
‘human interiority’ – the inner world
– in futures studies; and providing a set of
integral tools and methods for aligning the
earlier developments in ‘a greatly expanded
metaperspective’. ‘Perhaps the single most
powerful insight to emerge is that it is depth
within the practitioner that allows us to get the
very best results from whatever methodology is
being used,’ he states (ibid: 29).
Gidley introduces another phase between
the critical and integral: an empowermentoriented, action-research component, which
has been lying dormant since the mid1990s, and is only now taking off (Gidley,
Bateman & Smith 2004). She describes
The hopes and fears of young Australians
the four approaches (excluding integral) as
being concerned with, respectively, probable,
possible, preferred and prospective futures.
Eckersley (2002, 2005) has suggested
that another way to look at people’s views
of the future is to distinguish between
expected (or probable), official (promised)
and preferred futures. he official future is
that extolled by political leaders, the future
their policies will deliver. Here the social
and psychological significance lies in part in
the level of tension, or degree of coherence,
between these three futures. Of particular
importance is that young people do not see
the official future of unlimited economic
growth and technological development as
delivering a preferred future, or addressing
the problems characterising the expected
future. Put another way, the future most
young Australians want is neither the future
they expect nor the future they are promised
under current national priorities.
Another tension, or dissonance, that many
futures researchers have noted is that
between young people’s personal future,
which is overwhelmingly optimistic and
positive, and the probable future of the world
or humanity, which is mainly pessimistic and
bleak. Most young people are confident they
personally will get what they want out of life:
a good job, travel, a partner and eventually a
family of their own. However, most young
people see the expected or probable future of
humankind largely in terms of a continuation
or worsening of today’s global and national
problems and difficulties. he probable
future is also a problematic future.
Futures studies across many countries
consistently reveal concerns about the pace
of life, loss of community, family conflict
and breakdown, growing social inequality
and division, crime and violence, rampant
consumerism, and destruction of the
natural environment (Hicks 2006). People’s
preferred futures emphasise close-knit
communities, more conviviality and intimacy,
13
social harmony, human-scale settlements
and technologies, and a clean, healthy
environment. he remarkable consistency
of people’s preferred futures has led to the
suggestion that these represent a ‘baseline’
future, perhaps revealing humanity’s
evolutionary and historical origins.
Hicks (2006) stresses the importance of
futures to education, describing it as the
missing dimension. He underscores the
hazards of the bleak images of the future and
the necessity for hope. ‘Apocalypse is at out
fingertips in a way that it never was before,’
he says (ibid: 111), and cites hompson
(1996): ‘... we should not underestimate
the susceptibility of the human mind to
apocalyptic ideas, especially at times of rapid
change. Apocalyptism ... feeds on uncertainty
and disorientation ... [and] is astonishingly
versatile. End time scenarios have the ability
to adapt to their surroundings through a
rapid process of mutation.’ (Hicks 2006: 110)
At the same time, however, a desire for
utopia, an end to human ills and the creation
of a just and equitable society, always lie just
below the surface of the human imagination,
Hicks says: a mythic need to which we can
only keep returning. he current interest in
envisioning preferred futures represents an
often unconscious upwelling of that desire.
Freire (1994, cited in Hicks 2006) said that
he could not understand human existence,
and the struggle to improve it, apart from
hope and dream. Hence the importance of
stories. Richardson (1996, cited in Hicks
2006) says we need stories – myths and
folktales, as well as true accounts – to help
us hold the beginnings, middles and ends of
our lives together. ‘Without them we shall
not have hope; yes, to lose stories is to lose
hope, but conversely to construct and cherish
stories is to maintain hope.’ (Hicks 2006: 77)
Future studies sits at the crossroads of
apocalyptic fear and utopian hope. And
here it links to research into storying and
narrative.
14
Narrative studies
Within academic circles, interest in narrative
is currently growing but the tradition of
narrative studies is not new. Over the last
40 years, literature from anthropology,
literary arts, history, psychology, sociology,
moral philosophy, theology and education
has increasingly drawn attention to the
significance of stories both for ongoing
community life and for individuals
constructing their own lives.
For example, coming from an anthropological
perspective, Lévi-Strauss (1979) charted how
the ‘schema’ or central ideas of communities
are carried between generations in the
stories that they tell, and that story is a
powerful vehicle for transporting ideas over
both time and space. History reveals how
this transmission is something that some
nationalities and traditions have achieved
particularly effectively.
Meanwhile, both literary arts and
psychological traditions have been exploring
the close inter-twinings of identity, story, and
myth. For several decades social scientists
have explored how individuals make meaning
and construct identities in story (eg see
Strauss 1977). Within moral philosophy,
Taylor (1989) suggests individuals’ stories are
narratives of progress, charting the journey
towards and away from ‘the good’ or valued
goal-states.
More recently, a growing body of narrative
theory (eg see Bruner 1987, Gergen and
Gergen 1988) has drawn attention to the
significance of narrative in the multiple and
changing ways that people make sense of
their lives and identities. hat is, the same
people can tell quite different stories about
themselves, or a series of events, to quite
different effect.
Out of the field of education comes the
realisation that the kinds of stories social
groups tell actually shape history (eg see
Freire 1973). How people tell a story will
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
shape how they act, so what gets selected
as being important, and how it is told, is
inherently political. As a result, the narrative
tradition has been significant for exploring
social differences and social inequalities, and
how these are differently being experienced
and lived out.
Another significant shift in broader
understandings happened when poststructuralist writers (eg Foucault 1980)
began to highlight and question the way in
which the stories that individuals and social
groups tell about themselves and others are
constructed in the context of socially shared
storylines or ‘discourses’. hey argue that
these publicly shared storylines are steeped
in power relations, and selective in the ‘truths’
that they tell.
Alongside raising consciousness about
problems and divisions, the narrative
tradition has also been important for
highlighting ways ahead. In anthropology,
Clifford Geertz (1973) has cautioned
that when researchers write about other
cultures and communities, it is too easy
to make theories that are over-simplified
and impoverished. he alternative, Geertz
suggests, is to seek detailed and ‘thick’ or ‘rich’
descriptions of the lives, worlds, meaning
systems and lived experiences of those
whom researchers study. Others (White
2000, Denzin 2001, Wierenga 2001, 2002,
forthcoming) have continued to develop
the notion of thick and thin stories, and
their important role in enriching both social
research and social life.
Some of the most compelling insights
about the power of narrative continue to be
developed through therapeutic practitioners.
Since the early 1990s narrative therapists
have explored the process of ‘re-storying’
shattered lives (White and Epston 1990,
White 1995). White highlights the dynamics
of the re-storying process and the role of
witnesses. He also explains the importance
of hearing, rather than silencing, the stories
The hopes and fears of young Australians
of despair because from these other critical
narratives can be constructed: about the
character of the speaker and about possible
action.
Concurrently, within youth research
tradition, there has been growing evidence
of the significance of narrative in the way
young people make their lives. Wierenga
(1999, 2001, 2002, forthcoming) has
highlighted the powerful role of ‘storying’
in the way that individuals are able to make
lives. Her work highlights the correlation
between storylessness and paralysis, between
narrative and capacity to act. Probably most
significantly, her research findings explain: ‘a
story will only grow where somebody trusted
is listening’ (Wierenga 2002: 11).
As shown above, many have drawn on
narrative to explore some of the most
significant social questions: about societies
and their survival, about reasons for living,
ways of living, and the complex relationships
between individuals and their societies.
Narrative has become central to explorations
of social change and human dignity, and
people’s capacity to act within and on the
world. It weaves through topics that are
seen as central concerns from different
disciplinary perspectives, and perhaps this
is why it keeps emerging in layers through
contemporary research.
Over time, the awareness of some researchers
turned beyond the people or practices being
studied, to also notice the form of particular
research stories themselves. Questions from
these writers sensitised other researchers
to look for grand narratives and alternative
narratives, or stories from the margins – and
ask questions like: ‘What is not being said
here? In this particular story whose stories
are excluded, silenced, and whose histories
are erased?’
From a narrative perspective, research
stories, evidence or knowledge from any
disciplinary tradition can also be understood
as recognising different stories about ‘the
15
problem’, claiming different kinds of evidence
as ‘truth’, and leading different stories about
possible solutions. A recent example of a
project exploring this is described in our
previous report (Eckersley, Wierenga &
Wyn 2006a), which focused on young
people’s wellbeing, intentionally creating
conversation across different traditions (eg
biological science/sociology). As explained
in the introduction, this led to both areas of
agreement and ‘flashpoints’.
hese streams of thinking mentioned above
also come together in this project. Readers
might like to keep these things in mind as
they listen to the different voices.
Future visions and wellbeing
People’s concerns about the future of the
world and humanity matter, regardless of
whether they are ‘factually’ or ‘objectively’
valid. he erosion of faith in society and
its future influences the way people see
their roles and responsibilities, and their
relationship to social institutions, especially
government. It denies people a social ideal to
believe in and a wider framework of meaning
in their lives, so increasing the psychological
‘load’ on personal expectations.
his issue has taken on added urgency
because our perceptions of the future are
increasingly shaped by the images of global
or distant threat and disaster to which
people are exposed: earthquakes, hurricanes,
floods, disease pandemics, terrorist attacks,
genocide, and famine. While these hazards
are not new, previous fears were never so
sustained and varied, nor so powerfully
reinforced by the frequency, immediacy and
vividness of today’s media images. his effect
seems certain to intensify as global warming
and other threats begin to impact more
deeply on our lives.
Our responses to this situation involve
subtle and complex interactions between
the world ‘out there’ and the world ‘in here’
(in our minds). hese have implications
16
for both personal wellbeing and social
cohesion. Psychological research suggests
that adaptability, being able to set goals and
progress towards them, having goals that
do not conflict, and viewing the world as
essentially benevolent and controllable are all
associated with wellbeing (Eckersley 2005).
Biomedical research has shown that people
become more stressed and more vulnerable
to stress-related illness if they: feel they
have little control over the causes of stress;
don’t know how long the source of stress
will last or how intense it will be; interpret
the stress as evidence that circumstances
are worsening; and lack social support
for the duress the stress causes (Sapolsky
2005). Negative expectations of the future
of the world and humanity are likely to
impact on several of these states, most
obviously by encouraging perceptions of
the world as hostile and dangerous and that
circumstances are deteriorating.
hese expectations also shape how societies
respond to the challenges of the future.
Eckersley (2006) has argued that people are
being drawn in at least three directions by
the prospects of dramatic, even catastrophic,
change: towards nihilism (a loss of belief ),
fundamentalism (a retreat to certain belief ),
and activism (a transformation of belief ).
hese responses highlight how people,
individually and collectively, can react very
differently to the same perceptions of threat
and hazard; in effect, they represent different
narratives through which people make sense
of what is happening and how to respond.
He suggests all three responses are growing
in social intensity, a head-to-head contest
that, sooner or later, will shatter the status
quo. Nihilism and fundamentalism represent
maladaptive responses to threat, whatever
their short-term or personal appeal. Because
they do not address the root causes of a
problem, they risk amplifying the costs
to human wellbeing. Such strategies have
led in the past to the collapse of societies
confronting environmental strains (Wright
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
2004, Diamond 2005). Activism is an
adaptive response because it tackles the
fundamental task of redirecting the future.
In other words, it is critical that society
encourages a constructive social response,
and work with young people to create
positive storylines or pathways to their
preferred futures.
Futures polls: losing faith in the
official future?
he project included a quantitative
component to assess the attitudes of young
Australians to personal, national and global
futures and if these attitudes have changed
over time. hese surveys also explored
more specific questions about science and
technology and their future impacts. his
part of the project provides a broader context
to the qualitative research – a less rich but
more representative picture of young people’s
views.
he polls conducted by Ipsos Mackay
Research (2005a, 2006a,b) included
questions that were asked previously in
1988 and/or 1995. he Ipsos Mackay
surveys were conducted online, involving
about 1000 Australians aged 18 and over
(age group cited here 18-24 years, n=110,
96, 86); the 1995 survey for the Australian
Science, Technology and Engineering
Council (Eckersley 1999) was a telephone
survey of 802 Australians aged 15-24 years;
the 1988 survey for the Commission for the
Future (unpublished) involved face-to-face
interviews with 1026 Australians aged 14
years and over (age group cited here 20-29
years, n=238).
he small sample sizes of young people in
several of the surveys limit their statistical
power; the different methodologies used
also make direct comparisons difficult (for
example, the online survey offered a ‘don’t
know’ option; the telephone survey allowed
this response but did not offer it, reducing
the numbers that chose it). Nevertheless, the
The hopes and fears of young Australians
broadly similar results across age groups, and
the consistency of changes over time across
these groups, do indicate changes in concern
about national and global futures.
Personal, national and global futures
Most young Australians remain optimistic
about their own personal futures. here has
been little change between 1988 and 2005;
83 per cent were optimistic or hopeful about
their own lives in 1988, and 85 per cent in
2005. In 1988, those aged 20-29 years stood
out from other age groups in saying they
were ‘very’ optimistic (35 per cent, compared
to 23 per cent for all ages); in 2005, this gap
had closed, with an increased proportion
of older people now claiming to be very
optimistic (36 per cent for the 18-24 years
age group, and 39 per cent overall).
However, most young Australians are
pessimistic about the future of humanity.
his was the case two decades ago and
remains true today. In 1988, 40 per cent
were optimistic and 55 per cent pessimistic;
in 2005, the figures were 38 per cent and 60
per cent respectively. Other results suggest
concerns about the future have deepened
over the past decade or two. Asked to choose
between two statements about the world in
the 21st century, only 16 per cent in 2005
thought it was likely to be ‘a new age of peace
and prosperity’, down from 41 per cent in
1995; 65 per cent opted for ‘a bad time of
crisis and trouble’, up from 55 per cent in
1995 (Q1).
Optimism about Australia’s future also
appears to have fallen in the past decade. he
proportion saying quality of life in Australia
in about 15 years’ time would be better
changed from 28 per cent in 1988 to 35 per
cent in 1995 and to 24 per cent in 2005; the
proportion that said it would be worse went
from 36 per cent in 1988 to 34 per cent in
1995 and to 49 per cent in 2005 (Q2).
Offered two positive scenarios of Australia’s
future – one focused on individual wealth,
economic growth and efficiency and enjoying
17
‘the good life’, the other on community,
family, equality and environmental
sustainability – 63 per cent expected the
former in 1995 and 77 per cent in 2005; 81
per cent preferred the latter in 1995 and 89
per cent in 2005 (Q3). In other words, the
gap between expectations and preferences
has widened since 1995.
In summary, most young Australians are
personally optimistic about their own lives,
but a growing proportion appear to believe
quality of life is declining, despite a decadeand-a-half-long economic boom that has
seen sustained, strong economic growth,
declining unemployment and rising incomes.
he gap between expected and preferred
futures for Australia has widened, and
concerns about the future of the world have
increased.
Young Australians’ views on quality of life and the future: 1988, 1995 and 2005
Q1:
enjoying ‘the good life’. Power has shifted
to international organisations and
business corporations. Technologically
advanced, with the focus on economic
growth and efficiency and the
development of new consumer
products.
Thinking about the world in the 21st
Century, which of the following statements
most closely reflects your view? *
I.
By continuing on its current path
of economic and technological
development, humanity will overcome
the obstacles it faces and enter a new
age of peace and prosperity.
II.
More people, environmental
destruction, new diseases and ethnic
and regional conflicts mean the world
is heading for a bad time of crisis and
trouble.
II.
1995: age 15-24 years: 41% chose I, 55%
chose II.
2005: age 18-24 years: 16% chose I, 65%
chose II (all ages: 23% I, 66% II).
Q2:
Thinking about Australia in 15 years time,
that’s the year 2020, do you think that our
overall quality of life (QoL) will be better
than it is now, worse than it is now, or about
the same? (time period adjusted to ask
about QoL about 15 years ahead).
1988: 28% thought QoL would be better, 36%
worse, and 35% the same (all ages: 30%, 40%,
29%).
a)
b)
2005: 24% thought QoL would be better, 49%
worse, and 18% the same. (all ages: 23%, 46%,
25%)
Please read the following brief descriptions
of two very different possible futures of
Australia in 2020 and then give your opinion
of them. *
I.
18
A fast-paced, internationally
competitive society, with the emphasis
on individual wealth generation and
a)
Which of the two describes or
comes closer to the type of society
that you expect Australia will be?
b)
Which of the two describes or
comes closer to the type of society
you would prefer Australia to be?
1995: age 15-24 years: 63% expected I,
35% expected II.
2005: age 18-24 years: 77% expected I,
23% expected II (all ages: 73% I, 27% II).
1995: 35% thought QoL would be better, 34%
worse, and 29% the same.
Q3:
A greener, more stable society, where
the emphasis is on cooperation,
community and family, more equal
distribution of wealth, and greater
economic self-sufficiency. An
international outlook, but strong
national and local orientation and
control. Technologically advanced, with
the focus on building communities
living in harmony with the environment,
including greater use of alternative and
renewable resources.
1995: age 15-24 years: 16% preferred I,
81% preferred II
2005: age 18-24 years: 11% preferred I,
89% preferred II (all ages: 7% I, 93% II).
*
The scenarios were based on the findings of a series
of scenario-creation workshops conducted as part
of the 1995 survey. Those in Q3 were drawn from
young people’s preferred and expected futures.
However, with the latter, the negative expectations
were left out to allow a comparison between what
might be called the ‘official’ or promised future and
the preferred.
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
Future impacts of science and technology
Science and technology are a common
feature of futures scenarios. he 1995 study
(Eckersley 1999) found that, while young
people acknowledged the potential of science
and technology as a powerful tool in achieving a
preferred future, they generally did not believe in
technical fixes to social and global problems, and
were very concerned about some future impacts
of scientific and technological advances. A key
finding was the extent to which views on science
and technology were embedded in a wider social
context. he role young people saw for science
and technology – and hence their impacts
– changed markedly between the expected and
preferred futures (as evident in the poll scenarios
cited above).
In the 1995 survey, young people were asked
to agree or disagree with a range of specific
statements about science and technology. hese
questions were included in Ipsos Mackay online
surveys conducted in February and March 2006
(Ipsos Mackay Research 2006a,b). he results
are given in Table 1. Again, small samples sizes
in the 2006 surveys and differences in survey
methods mean comparisons are tentative.
Young people today appear less likely to think
technology is increasing unemployment, a finding
consistent with lessened community concern as
unemployment rates have fallen. hey remain
more likely to think that technology will be
used as instruments of government control
(77 percent) than that it will give people more
control over governments (31 per cent). hey
are more likely to think science will conquer new
diseases (78 per cent) than that it will provide
ways of growing enough food for a growing
world population (40 per cent) or of solving
environmental problems without the need to
change lifestyles (33 per cent).
Compared to older age groups, young people
appear more likely to believe science and
technology will solve environmental problems
(18-24 years: 33 percent; age 55+ years: 15 per
cent), but also more likely to think computers
and machines will take over the world (18-24
Table 1: The opinions of young Australians on aspects of the future role of science and technology, 1995 and 2006
Issue
Agree (%)
Disagree (%)
Don’t know (%)
Computers and robots are taking over jobs,
increasing unemployment.
1995
58
40
3
2006
37
52
10
Advances in computers and other technologies
will make democracy stronger, giving people more
control over their own lives and governments.
1995
43
51
6
2006
31
38
30
Science will find ways to conquer the new diseases
appearing in the world.
1995
87
11
2
2006
78
9
13
Governments will use computers and technology to
watch and regulate people more.
1995
78
20
3
2006
77
15
8
Science and technology will find ways of solving
environmental problems without the need to
change our lifestyle.
1995
45
52
3
2006
33
47
20
Science and technology are alienating and isolating
people from each other and from nature.
1995
53
43
4
2006
30
53
17
Computers and machines will eventually take over
the world.
1995
35
62
3
2006
36
49
15
Science will find ways to produce enough food to
feed the growing world population.
1995
39
58
4
2006
40
33
27
Science and technology offer the best hope for
meeting the challenges ahead of us.
1995
69
28
3
2006
65
15
21
The hopes and fears of young Australians
19
years: 36 per cent; age 55+ years: 11 per cent),
and less likely to consider that technology will
make democracy stronger (18-24 years: 31 per
cent; age 55+ years: 46 per cent).
Generally speaking, the findings do not suggest
any major shifts in young people’s perceptions
about the effects of science and technology in
their lives.
Summing up
From an orthodox political viewpoint, the poll
findings are striking, given the sustained good
economic news over this period. he results
suggest a deepening rift between political
action, with its focus on economic indicators,
and public opinion about quality of life. hey
are consistent with those of the 2005 Mind
and Mood report from Ipsos Mackay Research
(2005b), which found a growing concern about
the state of Australian society – rougher, tougher,
more competitive, less compassionate – that
was producing stress, edginess and a feeling of
personal vulnerability. Australians felt ‘we seem
to lurching from one difficulty to another with
the prospect of a serious crisis emerging’.
Overall, the results point to growing loss of
faith in a future constructed around notions of
material progress, economic growth and scientific
and technological fixes to the challenges of this
century. Many young people (and older) no
longer believe in the ‘official story’ of the future on
which governments base their policies.
20
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
Youth Futures Consultation Day
Helen Cahill
he goal of the youth consultation forum
was to provide an opportunity for adults to
engage in a research dialogue with young
people about their view of the future. A
number of techniques were used to structure
the dialogue. hese included discussion,
brainstorming and drama-based techniques
involving the creation and portrayal of
images, narratives and scenarios.
Techniques of role-based enquiry (dramabased activities) were used alongside the
more conventional focus group methods. My
previous experience in using drama-based
methods to research with young people
(Cahill 2001, 2002, 2005, 2006, in press) has
indicated that they make it possible for the
participants to engage in a research dialogue
which assists the participants to:
•
•
•
•
•
•
Work across boundaries associated with
age, role, gender and culture to learn with
and from each other;
Realise that their voice matters and will
be heard;
Generate a sense of community,
connectedness and shared purpose;
Show as well as tell others about their
experiences;
Investigate the inter-connected nature
of the personal, social, institutional and
environmental conditions that affect
their lives;
Deepen their understanding of the way
in which norms, assumptions, traditions
and values govern behaviour and shape
responses to problems;
The hopes and fears of young Australians
•
•
•
•
Create models for action and rehearse for
change;
Generate the hope and agency that
enables engagement in emancipatory
action;
Connect to the broader sense of moral
purpose that informs the research; and
Share in a responsibility for the research
to contribute to practical and ethical
outcomes.
he communal and multi-modal process
generates a capacity-building form of
research. As well as identifying problems,
participants consider the need for change;
explore the social, emotional, political
barriers which constrain action; rehearse
change-strategies; generate hope and passion
for change; and enhance their sense of
personal and collective agency.
The workshop story
he following account, written from my
perspective as the facilitator of the research
workshop, describes each of the activities
that the participants were engaged in,
and gives a brief account of the responses
that were forthcoming. My description is
followed by twelve different accounts of
the day, each carrying interpretations about
the value of the day and the meaning of the
work presented. Five accounts come from
the students themselves and seven from the
adult investigators who participated with the
young people.
21
hese accounts provide a series of multiple
perspectives, each of which throws a
different light on the nature and meaning
of the event. Many points of similarity or
resonance can also be noted between the
accounts. he young people, for example,
highlight the value of being listened to.
hey appreciate the provision of a deep
attending which is so rare in their experience.
hey note the need to look at these ‘serious’
issues and enjoy being able to do so in a ‘fun’
way. hey appreciate the way in which the
drama techniques provide the possibility
of exploring these issues in ensemble, not
only working with each other, but also
working across the usual boundary of
adult/youth. hey also note the value of
techniques that help them to access and
articulate their thoughts and it seems that
being in this atmosphere of attending and
high expectation allows them to express how
deeply they care about global issues which
are usually left in the back of their minds.
he adult views can be noted for their
points of similarity as well as their points of
difference. Each of the adults commented on
the young people’s valuing of the listening
they were given, theorising about the role of
integrative relationships in equipping young
people to think about as well as to live into
their futures. Other similarities include
concern about the difficulty the young people
seemed to experience in imaging possible
actions for themselves and the lack of a sense
of accountability or politicisation relating to
change.
he workshop was conducted in six key
phases and occurred across one day, with a
mid-morning and a lunch break. he enquiry
was designed to explore the key themes of
the imminent personal future, hopes for the
short-term (5 years) personal future, fears
for the long-term world future (20-30 years),
and actions to build the preferred future.
here were 21 youth participants. 18 of them
were Year 10 students of Drama at ‘Seaside
22
High School’ (a fictional name) (8 females
and 10 males), and three were tertiary
students (females) with an interest in drama
and a continuing connection to Seaside High
School via the drama teacher. he school
students attended with their drama teacher
who was also one of the adult participants.
here were ten adult participants (5 females
and 5 males). hey represented a range of
disciplinary backgrounds including sociology,
history, youth studies, futures studies, arts,
education, psychology and youth affairs. he
adults also represented a range of generations
with participants aged in their late twenties
(2), thirties (3), forties (2), and fifties (3).
he academic panel met at the start of the
day to introduce themselves to each other
and to be briefed on how the research process
would proceed. hey met again once during
the workshop and reconvened at the end of
the day to discuss their interpretations and
responses to the material that had emerged
in the workshop. During the day the adults
participated with the young people, playing
in the early dramas and later stepping back to
observe the creative activities, but remaining
participants in the reflective discussions.
Phase One: Generating the
communicative space
Phase One of the workshop was designed
to build the atmosphere of collegiality,
inclusion and social support that would be
fundamental to supporting the interactions
to follow (Hughes, Bellamy et al 2000).
he first activities were designed to assist
participants to work together across the
adult/youth divide. hey were also designed
to accommodate the fact that most of
the adult participants would not identify
themselves as ‘drama literate’ in that they
were not accustomed to representing their
ideas in the dramatic form.
We began with a set of short, paired
activities designed to have adults and young
people mix and interact, whilst also focusing
on the theme of the consultation. he first
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
ice-breaker activities called upon players to
meet in pairs and find out a few things about
each other (a two-way research process via
mini-interviews). his process was repeated
a few times, thus establishing a pattern of
interchange or two-way dialogue in which
both parties asked questions and both made
offerings or answers. his is a somewhat
different pattern from that commonly used
in interview-based research where often
there is a division between respondent and
enquirer (Holstein 2002). I intended that
this dialogic pattern inform the pattern for
our work together, so the young people were
not the only ones who were asked to consider
and share about the future.
he paired interviews were then followed by
a number of grouping tasks in which players
were asked to take up positions in the room
that indicated the categories they belonged
to. Some categories asked for groupings
according to age, thus showing the range
of generations represented in the room.
Others called for cross-age groupings such
as birth months, number of siblings, tastes
in food, thus showing that participants may
have points in common despite their age
differences. his was a symbolic reminder
at the commencement of the work that
we should avoid the tendency to assume
similarity and group all members of an
age cohort when we talk about them, thus
showing a lack of regard for the variety and
differences within the age-based membership
group.
Phase Two: Considering the imminent
personal future
he thematic intention of Phase Two of the
workshop was to focus on the young people’s
perceptions of their personal and imminent
futures. he tasks for Phase Two of the
workshop were also designed to build a sense
of ‘literacy’ in the group around the use of
the drama-based techniques as a means of
showing and telling.
The hopes and fears of young Australians
he participants were asked to work in
cross-age pairs to enact a scenario in which
a parent and young person expressed
conflicting views about what the young
person should select as their post-school
pathway. he participants were left to
choose how to cast their pairs. Some elected
to put the adult in the parent role, whilst
others cross-cast with the teenager playing
the parent and the academic playing the
young person. Each pair tried out their
scene simultaneously, creating a dialogue
and a relational dynamic in their scene. We
then took a short look at each scene, just
long enough to gain a sense of what the
struggle was about as well as how it was being
manifested between the two characters.
he play back of these scenes quickly
revealed a range of pressures on young people
to find an education ‘pathway’ that would
guarantee them ‘success’ in life. In each of
the scenes portrayed some degree of tension
between a young person’s desire to find a
life that would reflect their interests, beliefs
and values, and the desire to find some
form of security. hose in role as parents
encouraged ‘safe’ choices (argued to be those
likely to bring financial security, status and
social acceptability). hose in role as the
young people expressed a desire to follow
their interests, curiosity, beliefs or values and
to make their own path. hus the scenes
replicated the conventional ‘wisdom’ about
what to consider in relation to one’s future.
What could also be noticed in observing
these scenes was that ‘choice’ itself was
played to be pivotal, relevant and risky.
Each scenario illustrated the notion that
choice (right choice or wrong choice) was
important. Choice was not only played as
risky (one might make the wrong choice), but
it was also the site of lobbying and struggle
(with different views expressed about what
constitutes a good or a bad choice). In this
the scenarios illustrated Beck’s notion of
a ‘risk society’ in which the young person
23
faces an increased burden of choice as they
negotiate an (apparently) individual pathway,
rather than enter a predictable, anticipated
and patterned path (Beck 1992). hese
scenarios sketched out a world in which
multiple generations (both the parents and
the young people) subscribe to the notion
of choice, without necessarily enquiring
about the degree to which choice actually
exists. A high level of autonomy is assumed,
and responsibility seems to be understood
as individualised and personalised. here
was little sense expressed that class, gender,
ability, ethnicity, or location might constrain
choice.
he dramatic offerings were then used as the
material around which to invite comment.
he participants were asked to consider
the degree to which the scenarios presented
actually reflected the way they experienced
the world. We thus explored the realitytesting question: To what degree is this like or
not like real life? What pressures do you think
young people feel in relation to their imminent
personal future?
he young people talked about the pressure
they feel not to disappoint parents; the
pressure to succeed in life; and the yearning
to be true to a self they were not very clear
about yet. hey also commented on how
uncertain they felt about their future, how
little opportunity there was to discuss
these issues, and how future choices were
associated with a hierarchy relating to entry
to ‘wiser’ or more ‘successful’ pathways. A
number of students commented on how
much pressure they feel to choose the ‘right’
path and how much covert ranking and
judgment goes on about the sort of subjects
you choose or tertiary or career course you
head for. hey reported that the pressure
to succeed in life is felt everywhere, from
making subject selections at the end of Year
10, to academic grades and gaining tertiary
entry scores or selecting tertiary courses,
and even to having the right friends, the
right image and engaging in the right social
24
activities. Many of them said they felt that
there was something wrong with them if
they could not imagine what they would do
in the future, or who they would ‘be’. hey
thought that expectations and pathways
are not so clear nowadays, and whilst this
may be experienced as a freedom to choose,
it was also felt as a burden in that it can be
frightening to have no sense of a probable
future for oneself.
I then set out to deepen the enquiry into
these scenes by using a dramatic device to
give voice to the multiple layers of thoughts,
feelings, assumptions, expectations, hopes
and fears that may have been part of the
inner world of the characters. We were
to seek the internal conversations or the
dialogue in the head (and the discourses that
inform this dialogue).
I asked for one of the scenes to be played
over again. Having watched it, volunteers
stepped forward to take on the role of
the Hidden houghts of the characters.
I interviewed the players in the Hidden
houghts roles, asking: What might this
character be thinking or feeling but not actually
saying out aloud? And what else? What might
s/he be hoping for? What might s/he be afraid
of? he players gave multiple answers to each
of these questions, and fellow participants
added their responses. he Hidden houghts
dialogue revealed a much more complex web
of fears and hopes than had been expressed
in the previous naturalistic scenes.
Key amongst the hopes expressed were the
young person’s yearning for belonging to
family, peers and community, and the desire
for the freedom to act on your own will and to
have your choices understood and accepted.
Also expressed was the urge to find meaning,
purpose, self-expression and a level of joy
in life. A strongly expressed fear was that
of disappointing the parent or of making
them feel that their efforts or generosity had
been wasted. Another dominant fear was
that of failure – of not finding a place in
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
the world or a group of people to enjoy life
with. he urge to break away from the adult’s
guidance that we had seen illustrated in
the naturalistic scenes was now depicted as
layered with the desire to please and the fear
of failure.
After the Hidden houghts exploration, the
participants engaged in a paired sharing
exercise in which they talked about the
pressure and influences that they felt were
affecting young people as they approached
their personal future. hese thoughts
were then shared in a plenary discussion.
Responses included that there’s a pressure
that makes it seem like all your choices are final
choices, and whatever you choose now will affect
the whole of your life. Others commented that
there was a pressure to fulfill your parents’
expectations, and a sense that there were
different paths but you must somehow
choose the ‘right’ path. hey described a
struggle to balance social and study life, and
the limiting factor of real world pressures
to do with money that affect your ideas about
doing stuff you believe in like working in a
developing country. Some of the pressures
around the ‘rightness’ of the path were
associated with what others (such as parents)
thought of your choice. Other pressures
involved a conflict in desires such as whether
you want to make a lot of money or be happy.
When asked what helps to keep a passion
alive, such as that associated with making a
difference to the world or following a dream,
the young people responded that support from
your parents, the opportunity to participate
with and share the dream with others, and
the inherent pleasure or reward of the activity,
could help to keep the dream alive.
he use of the Hidden houghts device
and the deepening discussion revealed
the complexity of the relationship to one’s
personal future. It assisted the participants
to move beyond the more stereotypical
portrayal of the young person as standing
apart from the adult world and showed the
The hopes and fears of young Australians
interconnected and interwoven nature of
the concerns, fears, hopes and interests of
both generations, and the potential tensions
between the urge for security (wealth) and
the urge to follow one’s values or dreams.
his suggests to me that young people’s views
about the future should not be studied in
isolation from the surrounding generation’s
views. he scenarios and the subsequent
discussion showed that the story of what a
future ‘should’ hold is in large part inherited
from one’s society and family. he discourses
that inform how we approach living our lives
have been well learnt, even if only consciously
taken up as something to be resisted. he
deeper portrayal of the layers of fear, hope,
desire and expectation was also a reminder
of how easy it is to allow young people to
represent only the ‘typical’ youth response.
he participants engaged in a richer and
more variegated telling of ‘who they are’ when
given a mode of representation that invited a
range of responses.
Phase Three: Representing the preferred
short-term future (5 years)
Phase hree of the workshop entailed
shifting the focus forward to imagine the
preferred short-term future. Participants
were asked what they hoped they would be
doing in five years, considering: What are
the essential elements I want to see in my life
in the next five years? hey were asked to
first brainstorm these hopes, with a recorder
working in each group. hen each task group
was asked to select elements from this list
and to convey via a ‘sculpture’ the essential
nature of their hopes.
he multi-age task groups of about four
or five worked together to find a way to
represent their hopes for their futures via the
‘sculpture’. he images were then presented to
the group who attempted to read the images
and ascertain what they represented. he
players also stated their design intentions
and thus articulated the concepts that they
had in mind.
25
he ‘hopes for the future’ tableaux illustrated
many of the material, social, financial,
experiential and spiritual desires named by
the group members in their brainstorms.
he dramatic images encapsulated the
co-existing desires for success and security
(via graduation and employment); purpose
(via contributing to others, or changing
or improving the world); creativity and
self-expression (via arts or community
participation); peace (via leisure, relaxation
or interaction with the natural environment);
adventure and fun (via travel); belonging
and happiness (via relationships); health
(via friendships and physical activity); and
thoughtful choices (at moments when
encountering ‘crossroads in pathways’).
he symbolic nature of the sculptures meant
that many of these hopes could be co-located
in the one dramatic image (the sculpture),
thus avoiding the creation of a false binary
between seeming opposites (eg security and
adventure) or an artificial hierarchy between
desires that were co-existent. he presence
of multiple co-existing desires means that
inevitably some tension will be experienced
as different desires predominate in the
moment of making choices.
Phase Four: Depicting the feared longterm future (20-30 years)
he next major question to be investigated
through the drama was: What do we fear
for the world’s longer-term future? he aim of
this question was to take the participants
well beyond their concern for themselves
as individuals, to focus on issues at an
environmental, national and global level.
Working in a new task group (this time
without the adults as co-players) they
were asked to brainstorm their fears for
the longer-term future, and in each group
one of the adult investigators recorded
the brainstorm. hey were then asked
to weave the most significant fears into a
‘nightmare’ scene, which would illustrate the
nature of these concerns to their audience.
26
he surrealist and symbolic nature of the
‘nightmare’ mode of portrayal was chosen
to assist the young people to represent the
impact of abstract or meta-fears.
Once they had prepared their scenarios, the
‘nightmares’ were presented to the group.
Fellow participants were invited to ‘read’ the
scenarios as if they were dream therapists
seeking to understand the sorts of fears or
concerns that could be affecting the youth
of today. Audience members thus engaged
in reading and interpreting the scenarios,
naming the sorts of fears and concerns that
they thought could be at play. he presenters
were also asked to speak to their intentions
in shaping the scene and thus also articulated
the sorts of fears they were concerned to
represent as well as their impact and the
inter-relationships between them.
he scenes depicted a range of deep concerns
about the future. he foremost amongst
them were concerns with environmental
degradation, terrorism, war, violence, nuclear
winter, and forms of surveillance and
governmental mind-control (via media and
drugs). What could be noted in the scenarios
was the universalised and de-personalised
nature of the anticipated problem. he
feared events were depicted as affecting all,
despite that there might be some groups
who might appear to be more the winners
than the losers. In this the young people
showed an imagined regard for the potential
plight of the species, rather than just for
particular groups, nations or peoples. In
this they illustrated their awareness that the
world, its peoples and their environments
are part of an interconnected whole. Poverty,
suffering, hunger, thirst, greed or ‘mindcontrol’, though experienced by individuals,
would be organic and systemic. A common
theme in the mode of portrayal was the
dehumanising of people, whether in the face
of war, privation, fear or forms of mediadriven mind-control. One young man
pointed out his group had considered that,
whilst the people might believe they are part
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
of a democracy, they might in the future
actually be under constant surveillance and
have their thoughts controlled via the media.
In discussing their concerns about people
becoming dehumanised, one young woman
commented that her group had hoped to
show that one fear for the future was that
you might ... forget that you are a person alive,
trying to live a life, and so instead of thinking
about the life, you think about work and getting
money and having war, and that becomes life.
his again was a form of dehumanisation or
a deep ethical disjuncture rupturing actions
apart from values.
What I noticed was that through these
poignant and haunting scenarios, the
young people depicted a deep caring for
the future of humanity (rather than just
for themselves), and a capacity to consider
the interconnection of the political and the
personal, and the inseparability of local and
global.
In the discussion following these scenes, I
asked the young people if they really did
worry about the sorts of things that they
had depicted in the nightmare scenarios.
he consensus was that they did have these
concerns, but that they might be in the
background of their mind or be forgotten,
unless something occurred to raise the topic,
or unless there was some possibility of
action. Some of the responses illustrated how
a concern could seem to be both present and
absent from their mind at the same time, and
tied up with concepts of agency and voice.
I never worry about it really except when
everyone’s talking about it – but I do
worry about it.
Everyone worries about it, but in reality
there is nothing we can do about it.
I think a lot of the idea about resources
being taken over – we think about that,
and we try to think now about how we’re
going to deal with it then. Really we
should be looking for ways to prevent it.
The hopes and fears of young Australians
he things I worry about most are like
either not being able to do something,
or no one else wanting to do something
about it. We know a lot of people who
want to do something about it.
Following the darkness of these images
(albeit that some had been presented interlaced with humour), I felt it was important
to ask the participants what helps to give
them hope when they think about the
problems that beset the world. he intention
of this activity was to gain insight into the
strategies that the young people perceived
themselves as using to maintain their hope
and optimism and thus their capacity to
take action. I also intended that those who
might feel defeated or despairing at the
picture painted of the world’s possible future
might learn from others how people cope
and thus add to their own coping repertoire
(Frydenberg 1997).
Responses gathered included statements
about belief in the power of political
responses such as collective action or
achieving a change in government; belief
in power of technological solutions; the
notion of social support such as that
attained by having a family around you; the
hope of getting a job where you can make
a difference; and learning from the past via
movies and books that have shown how
people have made changes or fought for
change.
he sharing of these thoughts called for a
more personal form of sharing than in much
of the prior discussion. I invited the adults
to share as well, as this seemed to me to
be an opportunity for the young people to
learn from a collection of committed adults
who clearly cared very much about building
a good future for the future generations.
he sharing both rested upon the trust and
camaraderie that had developed in the group
across the day and further contributed to an
atmosphere of intimacy and caring.
27
Watching these scenarios, and attending to
the subsequent discussion, illustrated to me
that young people think about the future in
global as well as personal terms. For anyone,
however, it is difficult to imagine how one’s
own actions can be a part of history, a history
that can bring about or avert this imagined
future. hus Phase Five of the workshop was
designed to ask the participants to identify
how they thought that they could be part of
history.
Phase Five: A case for action – inviting
the preferred future
In Phase Five of the workshop, the youth
participants engaged in the final dramabased enquiry task of identifying possible
actions to work towards a preferred future.
he intention of this task was to gain a sense
of what the young people imagine they or
others could or should do to help to build
the world that they wanted to live in. An
additional aim was to leave the participants
with some sense of personal agency despite
the mega-nature of the problems they had
just considered (Seligman 1995). In newly
re-formed task groups (of four to five youth
participants) they brainstormed possible
actions that could be taken to avert a future
such as that depicted in the ‘nightmare’ scenes
and create a more desired future. hey were
then asked to prepare a short ‘cartoon’ or set
of three frames that showed how an action
could be taken that would contribute to
building a preferred future. To do this they
not only had to think through what sort of
actions could be taken, but also had to select
the issue/s that they think most warranted
the attention of their audience.
he adult recorders reported that the young
people found this brainstorm to be very
challenging. It seemed that it was hard for
them to think up actions that would help to
make the world turn out ‘better’. his is not
surprising as short of magic, no small action
would of itself make a big change. Perhaps
these young people had also seen little
28
evidence of people acting to build such a
future. Nonetheless the lists were developed
and scenes prepared.
he ‘cartoon frames’ were shown and read
by the group. hey included actions that
were political, environmental, and relational.
Political strategies included joining with
others to make collective political protest,
cutting the strings of governmental control,
and turning off the TV to protect oneself
from media-created desire. Environmental
actions included taking shorter showers,
saving trees, re-using and recycling, and
disposing of rubbish in an appropriate way.
Relational strategies included ‘being’ the
change you want to see, being kind to others,
refraining from engaging in racial prejudice,
and seeking to work with and understand
those who were different.
When asked what they noticed about
engaging with this task, responses
foregrounded the challenge of transferring
from an easy focus on criticising the failure
of others to provide a solution, to a more
challenging focus on action or solutions.
he discussion went from world problems to
us making changes where we can. his was
seen to be a harder thing to think about.
It’s a bit harder to think about what you could
do. hey pointed to a lack of motivation or
a lack of integrity between knowledge and
action. It is stuff you already know but don’t do
– such as shorter showers. One person noted
that a form of laziness stops you. Some made
comments about the lack of a personal sense
of responsibility. Are we waiting for someone
in power to take action before we start to check
our own and others’ behaviour? We could work
together without having to wait for someone
else. One person mentioned that lack of
accountability or reprisals for breaches in
care for the environment meant that people
did not take enough care. here was some
discussion about whether their schooling
assisted them to feel sufficiently informed
or to feel responsible for their actions. Some
respondents identified that they gained
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
information about the environment from the
media more than from school. Others noted
that the actions they took were influenced
by their family’s response, such as walking or
riding instead of taking the car.
his reflective discussion on what it would
take to shift from a focus on problems
to an involvement in enacting solutions
showed that the participants perceived that
barriers to action were not chiefly due to
lack of knowledge, but rather with a lack of
engagement or discipline, or with a lack of
involvement in practices or traditions around
taking action.
To acknowledge that change was also about
what we hope others would do as well as
about what we plan to do ourselves, the
participants were asked to write a message to
a political leader, either real or imaginary, in
which they requested an action that would
contribute to changing the world. hese
messages were shuffled and distributed
and then read by groups who discussed
whether these requests would lead to positive
changes. Most of these requests related to
stopping involvement in war, attending to the
issue of global warming and environmental
degradation, stopping consumer greed, and
ensuring a more equitable distribution of
riches between and within nations.
Phase Six: Closure
As a closing activity the participants were
invited to complete ‘a postcard to one’s self ’ so
as to remind them of an action they intended
to take following the day’s workshop. he
intention of this activity was to remind the
participants that small personal actions are
also political actions and can be part of a
grassroots change (Waghid 2005). It was
also a way to link the one-off nature of the
workshop with ongoing life. I undertook to
post these cards within a week. he youth
participants (and some of the adults) took
up this invitation. Some put their notes
to themselves in sealed envelopes. Others
elected the post card mode. Most of the
The hopes and fears of young Australians
postcards contained messages about small
actions to take care of the environment, such
as reduced water usage, recycling or rubbish
reduction.
We returned to the circle to finish the day’s
proceedings. I asked each person to think
of something they would like to say to the
group about what they had valued in the
day or would take away to think about. he
intention of this activity was to give each
person a chance to speak as an individual as
much of their more public speaking had been
through collaborative forms. he activity
was also designed to focus on the positive
aspects of the day. Follow up written sheets
(to be completed back at school) would
give the opportunity for more detailed and
critical feedback. As many participants had
taken a social or personal risk to contribute,
it seemed appropriate for them to hear how
their actions had made a contribution.
he consistent message from the young
people was one of appreciation at being given
the opportunity to think and speak about
serious matters; to be really ‘heard’ by adults;
and to engage with each other and with the
adults in a playful and creative manner. A
number of them noted the absence of such
forums in their everyday and institutional
lives (both school and university) and the
lack of educational opportunities around
the issues of environment and world futures.
Some also noted that they intended to make
changes in their own lives and practices as a
result of their experience of the day.
It was not stressed out. No one got told
off and everyone was respected.
I really enjoyed today – meeting new people,
sharing ideas, yeah – and I’ll definitely
think about what we talked about, and not
spend so much time in the shower.
I’ve learned new things about different
aspects of how people think, and I’m
actually thinking more about the world, and
how we can be better off with the world.
29
One thing I realised – when you talk
to a group like this – we are worried
about how the world is going to turn
to, and wars, and that’s how it’s almost
going now – but that’s when it’s run by
a different generation – all us people
make the choices of how the future will
be – hearing the opinions and what we
believe in, it’s not necessarily going to
be like that – that’s given me a different
outlook.
One thing that was clear to me by the
end of the day was that the experience of
cross-generational dialogue, and the use of
playful, interactive and inclusive forms to
explore issues, had created an atmosphere
of community, of care, and of personal and
shared accountability for the future. My
sense was that the form as well as the focus
30
of the day has light to shed on our approach
to involving young people in building the
preferred future. hey found that gathering
around issues of shared concern and working
in collaborative, creative and reflexive modes
assisted them to reflect on how they could
align personal, social and political actions so
as to better express their inherent orientation
of care for the world, its peoples and the
environment. In this, the research process not
only provided a useful tool for understanding
youth perspectives on personal and global
futures, but also became a forum through
which participants could create a sense of
possibility about making a difference in the
world and begin to rehearse for action. In the
words of one young woman: this has left me
thinking about the next step.
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
Different Voices and Stories
his part of the report presents the
reactions of individual students and
researchers to the workshop. Our
intention is to allow a deeper reflection
on the experience, and to demonstrate
the range of perspectives and insights,
and the convergences and divergences,
which emerged. For ethical reasons, we
have changed the names of the students.
Michael’s story
Michael Waugh (age 35: Drama teacher
of students present at the workshop, with a
research interest in student participation)
I am a teacher of the young people
who attended the ‘Youth Futures’
research workshop. My role was to act
as advocate and carer. I am currently
researching students’ sense of power
and agency experienced through drama,
but this interest was secondary to
my concern about the young people’s
personal experiences of the day.
I was responsible for marking the
roll, making sure that they arrived
and left safely and that they were
comfortable and happy. I had formed
close relationships with these people
over several years of teaching them,
and being involved in a variety of
experiences with them in and out of
class. I wanted the academics to like the
kids, and for the kids to enjoy the day.
I have a great deal of respect for the
facilitator, Helen Cahill, and wanted
the day to be a success for her. I felt
The hopes and fears of young Australians
Doug’s reflection
‘Doug’ (Year 10 Drama student)
Our future is a very interesting topic. It is
something that can often be drummed out of
our minds by the demands of the present.
I thought researching our views through theatre
was a fantastic idea, especially the improvisation
activities, because this is when you bring up
thoughts and ideas that are more in your subconscious and that you may not come up with
simply in an interview scenario.
Aside from all the bad things we found about
the world and our fears for the future, it was
refreshing to have a refocus on all the good
things. hese things included the fact that
although you might think that people are
making bad decisions now, they are not the
people who make the decisions in the future
and things could change. We might just be
swept off into a completely unforeseen reality.
Working with the academics in the drama
atmosphere was also a lot of fun and it was great
to see everyone working so co-operatively in all
the activities. he skits were all entertaining and
interesting to analyse in the way of interpreting
the dreams, fears and metaphors.
Over all I think the day was a great success and
I hope everyone got something nice from it. I
would very much like to see drama used as a
way of learning in a lot more areas of study as I
think it is a very effective tool.
PS I also enjoyed getting the Tuesday off school.
It is really the most tedious day of the week.
31
real ownership and responsibility for these
students. hey’ve been involved in my drama
programs and classes. I’m proud of how I’ve
raised the profile of Drama in the school,
and particularly proud of how I’ve been
instrumental in increasing the participation
of boys in Drama. hey are my kids. hey
are here because they know and trust me. I
have a duty to make sure that they are not
misrepresented.
While part of me wanted to learn about
what futures are imagined by my students,
my ears were tuned in more carefully to
individual stories, and this coloured the way
that I read their drama. I feel that my duty
to be advocate to these young people should
extend into my reflections about the day.
While I can’t tell about all of their stories, I
feel that it is important to know who some of
these young people are.
he day of the workshop was also:
•
•
•
•
•
32
he funeral of an English teacher from
our school. Several of the students
had wanted to attend this funeral, and
were experiencing some grief after the
sudden death of the teacher in the week
preceding the workshop;
Less than a week after the funeral of one
of the participant’s grandparents. his
participant was also worried about their
best friend who went home during the day;
he first public ‘performance’ for several
students who felt very scared and
nervous. hough an emphasis was put on
experiencing the drama activities rather
than performing, some of the young
people felt apprehensive about being
judged as poor performers;
Less than a week after a very successful
school production performance where
many of the participants had experienced
a strong sense of achievement and
community; and
A day where several students would
normally have classes that they did not
enjoy or feel successful. he day was
a welcome change for many of these
students.
Some of the students experienced some
deeper fears and sadness about a variety of
personal issues. his probably didn’t come
out of the work, but impacted on their
engagement. here was also a practical
health problem for one of the participants.
hough all of the students wanted to stay,
two of the students went home. he students
wanted to stay because there was a great deal
of laughter, interesting questions and respect
given to the students by significant adults.
Physically and emotionally, much of me was
not with the drama or the research, but with
the young people who were experiencing
sadness or joy because of these factors.
At times, I needed to be out of the room
counseling students or organising some
aspect of their care. Of course, what I’ve
mentioned is only a small part of their
stories. Nonetheless, these individual
narratives were much louder (to me and to
them) than the stories being told through
the workshop. I realised that many students
could not have committed themselves to
imagining some time in the future when the
voices of now or just the other day or within
the next week were so intense, immediate and
all encompassing.
I was a privileged observer of the day. I was
able to listen in to the conversations between
researchers as well as hear some of the
students’ private stories. Many of the adults
knew little about drama, and all of these
people knew nothing about the young people
(apart from Helen Cahill, who had come
in to meet these students over three double
lessons leading up to the workshop day).
Helen Cahill was a contact point for many
of the students, and I felt that I shared the
sense of care for the kids with her.
Some of the views expressed by the adult
researchers drew links to theories about
hope and hopelessness, raised criticism
about contemporary education in terms of
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
how it has failed to provide these students
with stories from the past that would
provide inspiration about human resilience,
or were interested in drama as a research
methodology. I kept thinking about the
young people and some of the amazing
things that had been achieved:
•
•
•
•
One of the students who had said that
they were not a drama person, but I’ll
have a go commented at the end of the
day that they had had a good time and
met people. his person had not been
engaged at school, had been often truant
and felt embarrassed about performance.
Performing without embarrassment
and feeling valued by other people was
significant for this student, and for me as
their teacher;
One of the students commented that it
was a good day because no one got into
trouble. his was important because
they had a history of being disciplined
and feeling misunderstood by teachers.
Experiencing a full day without being
criticised by an authoritarian figure was
significant for this student, and for me as
their teacher;
One of the students said that they felt
relieved that other people feel the same as
me. his person was a popular student
who had experienced success in a number
of different forums. It was significant to
them that they didn’t feel alone in their
thoughts or feelings about the future. It
was important that they had a chance to
speak to their peers about these things, as
the school didn’t often give them a chance
to engage in this type of conversation. It
was an important reminder to me about
not taking students at face value, and
realising that all young people can feel
alone, regardless of popularity;
One of the students said that they felt
that they were listened to with respect
and that this didn’t often happen with
grown ups at school. his was significant
for this young person, and for me as a
The hopes and fears of young Australians
teacher at a school that perhaps doesn’t
often value the thoughts and feelings of
young people as much as we should.
I have always seen drama as learning through
and about the body. It was interesting then
how much I felt that the day was about being
disembodied. Many of the young people
represented their fears about the future in
terms of a faceless image of power that had
been dehumanised in its representation. For
example, one of the scenes showed a slow,
mechanical, expressionless figure voicelessly
pointing orders from a high physical level.
Equally, the hope for the future was often
in a superhuman shape, such as space travel,
alien intervention or some other type of
technological advancement, or it was difficult
to embody as any significant action other
than picking up rubbish or taking shorter
showers. he fear about the future as much
as the hope for the future seemed to be
not so much out of the imagining of these
young people as much as being outside of
their embodied realities. Perhaps they don’t
have the chance to feel what it’s like to be in
control of their own futures.
hat is not to say that my students don’t
have resources gained through formal
education. hey have a capacity to read and
critique media they know to be constructing
realities that should not be blindly accepted.
One of the tableaux represented a puppet
whose strings were being cut. Another
showed a television being switched off. hey
know who has the power, and they know
that it’s not them. hey know who has been
preventing them from having power. Parents
and teachers figured as the faces of power
in much of the scene work. John Howard
and George W Bush appeared as abstracted
extensions to these locales of authority.
Again, I thought about those individual
stories and individual achievements. While
the other researchers were focused on the
stories of the future told through the dramas,
I realised that a great deal was being said
about the young people’s futures in what was
33
sitting at the edge of these dramas, in these
voices that were louder to me than to other
adults in the room because of my relationships
with the young people. hese surely were
more about the lived experiences of these
young people than of a danger or a hope for
relief that was outside of their control.
Within the research panel there was discussion
around students needing stories about the past
to see how humans have overcome adversity.
As much as this is important and on the
current public agenda, I’m not sure that they
would believe all they are told. hey’ve been
trained to be critical of the way that stories
are constructed. I am not convinced that these
stories about the past would speak any louder
than the individual stories.
My students presented a disembodied
version of the future. In part the voices of
now were perhaps louder than the distant
voices of later and certainly more relevant
than the voices of then. I was again inspired
by the work done by Helen Cahill, and
learned a great deal about how to work with
students with respect, and how to reflect
on my own practice. I was left wondering
whether the power structures in schools
and families allowed students the agency to
truly imagine (through their own bodies)
what things might be like at a time in the
future when they inhabit bodies that control
the world. As one of my students said: I
think that things won’t be so bad in the future,
because the leaders will be people like us, and
not the current generation of leaders that have
left the world in the state that it’s in.
I’m left wondering whether these students
would be better equipped to embody a future
of power and control if that sense of agency
was a real part of their current experiences:
what if the voices of now spoke to young
people about being able to take meaningful
action? his question provides my challenge
and duty to represent these young people
back at school, beyond the responsibility of
that workshop day.
34
Bill’s reflection
‘Bill’ (Year 10 Drama student)
Last Tuesday, a group of Year 10
Drama students went to Melbourne
University to participate in a study
about youth’s views of the future.
On the whole, I believe it was a very
good experience. Before going to the
place, I really didn’t know what to
expect. I was imagining for the event
to be rather formal and awkward,
however this was very wrong. After
arriving and getting into the swing
of things, it was a very friendly
environment. It was really nice to
be treated with respect from adults.
Generally, older people (good, I feel
stereotypical) all look down a little
on youths; however, here we were
treated like equals and the adults there
seemed genuinely interested in what
we had to say. We all could sit and have
interesting conversations with one
another.
For the actual exercises, they were all
fairly simple theatre sport-ish things
which were fun. hey seemed a little
pointless; however they gave us a more
interesting way of expressing our ideas
than just straight out talking.
Talking to some of the other students
after the event, it was apparent that
everyone enjoyed it. It was good for
us because we were treated with
respect and our ideas could be openly
expressed without any fear of reprisal.
We got to associate with some really
nice adults, as well as the couple of exstudents who turned up who were all
really cool people. he people running
the event seemed like they probably got
what they wanted out of us, so it was a
well rounded day.
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
Dan’s story
Dan Woodman (age 26: sociologist with
interests in young people’s health and wellbeing
and post high-school transitions)
In this response, I follow one particular train
of thought that emerged for me during the
workshop. In doing this, several important
things are sidelined: the individual stories,
the nature of the interaction of the young
people with each other and with the older
researchers, the impact of the remarkable
pedagogy employed and the effects of a
multidisciplinary approach to research.
Others have commented on these topics
far better than I could. All I will say is that
the group was inspiring, and taking part a
privilege.
I focus instead on what I saw as some
broad commonalities in the way the group
performed and discussed issues of taking
action to shape both their personal future
and a broader social future. I suggest these
commonalities might be linked to a sense of
the future as uncertain and a weakening of
older narratives of action.
Social change and uncertainty
Young Australians, like the rest of us, live in
a world in which it seems that our personal
and social, national and global wellbeing
and security face predicaments that are
interrelated, urgent and on a global scale.
Contemporary Australia, with other nations,
is undergoing a complex conjunction of
economic, technological and cultural change
that has been labelled globalisation. We are
surrounded by hybrids; the problems we
face in the contemporary world are, more
often than not, natural and social, personal
and political, human and technological,
global and local. he complexity of the
challenges the world faces emerges from this
amalgamation of issues. It is often difficult
to calculate risk, attribute blame, precisely
identify victims, or to identify who is
responsible for taking action.
The hopes and fears of young Australians
Predicting the world of the next 10, 20 or 50
years is extraordinarily difficult. It is possible,
maybe even probable, that the current major
actors will rise further or fall while new
actors may surface, and that new forms of
politics and new ways of being in the world
may emerge. However, whatever the future
challenges that face the generation of which
our younger participants are members, both
in building an individual life and building
strong communities, it is likely that these
challenges will be global, interconnected, and
complex.
The personal biography and uncertainty
he workshop performances and discussions
on personal futures resonated for me with
the widespread notion in contemporary
sociological theory that managing the
‘personal biography’ in the face of relative
uncertainty has become increasingly
important (Giddens 1991, Beck &
Beck-Gernsheim 2002). In general, the
participants seem to see their lives as projects
focused on managing both possibility
and uncertainty. hey spoke of stress, of
feeling pressure from their own and others’
expectations about what paths they should
follow in life, and of uncertainty about how
to succeed on these paths. A few participants
seemed to be struggling with thinking about
their future and telling a positive story about
it. However, and taking into account the
differing level of ability, engagement and
pre-event reflection participants brought to
the day, those I worked with were generally
capable of telling hopeful stories about their
own futures. hey spoke of having a couple
of plans, a main plan and a backup or second
plan, in case the first plan did not work out
and seemed quite strategic in the way they
spoke about making choices, such as subject
selections, in a way that gave them options
later in life. hese stories were malleable and
multifaceted enough, I believe, to allow a
high degree of flexibility and resilience in the
face of uncertainty.
35
Social fears and uncertainty
While the predicaments facing Australian
society might be extraordinarily complex, the
young people I worked with at the workshop
seemed to be able to tell stories that helped
them understand their broader social fears.
While in some ways the issues they raised
were relatively new to the forefront of the
contemporary social imagination, such as
global warming and the ‘war on terrorism’,
there were some signs of continuity with
the past in the resources they drew on to
think about these issues. hey seemed to
appropriate some aspects in their telling of
their fears from the archetypal images in the
‘Western Canon’. he young people in my
group spoke about and performed fears of
total war, propaganda, control of the media,
dictatorships, mind control and drugs, which
had resonances with the plots of Orwell’s
1984 or Huxley’s Brave New World. Many
of these fears are not new to this generation,
but they linked these fears in creative and
complex ways with the newer fears, such as
global warming. It could be argued that some
of the detail within the stories were a little
confused or fanciful. Yet others, such as the
sociologist John Law (2004), would argue
back that the world might indeed be a little
confused and fanciful. While debates could
be had over whether these stories of society
are right or wrong, these young people seem
able to ask questions of what they are told,
see shades of grey and tell stories about the
global and interconnected nature of social
problems.
However, and unlike the discussions on how
to take action for personal futures, when it
came to discussing and performing possible
ways of taking action on these broader social
fears and challenges, the groups I worked
with found it remarkably difficult. hey
did eventually come up with some possible
actions, but spoke mostly of local and
personal actions (helping an older person
cross the street) and actions focused on
the management of personal consumption
36
(not littering, taking shorter showers).
Although one group mentioned collective
action, a similar focus on consumption and
local action seemed to emerge in the other
groups’ performances. hese are in many
ways positive actions, and the management
of personal consumption clearly links
with issues like global warming. Overall
however, there seemed to be a noteworthy
disconnect between the fears participants
held for Australian society, which had much
to do with global and national politics, the
media, knowledge and power, and most of
the actions they felt they could take to bring
about a preferred future.
Complexity and narrating engagement
Several possibilities come to mind to
explain this disconnection between fears
and actions. It might partly have to do with
the types of social predicaments Australia
faces and could face in the future. he
global and interconnected nature of the
problems we face, which the young people
I worked with seemed to grasp to some
extent, might make taking action seem
almost impossible. Another possibility is
that, as many participants were in Year
10 in high school, they had perhaps not
been exposed to the various options for
engagement, and accompanying narratives
of why to engage, that become more readily
available in institutions of higher education
or workplaces. Or alternatively, the other
researchers and I may have brought a
particular vision of what it means to take
social action to shape the future into the
workshop that limited our ability to see new
links between action and social fears amongst
the participants. Possibly, in a changing
world, researchers need to rethink their own
ideas of what it means to take future oriented
action. Many other, more or less plausible,
possibilities can be imagined and it would
be interesting to do further workshops to
explore these questions, possibly with slightly
older (post-high school) young people.
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
A closing about open stories
In general, this group of young people
seemed to both understand and be capable of
narrating complexity and uncertainty within
their own lives and a changing Australia.
Many seemed able to tell stories of engaging
with this uncertainty around their own
biographies, but most found this remarkably
difficult with questions of the broader social
future. Social narratives that allow people,
and communities, to tell their own story
about who they are and what they stand
for are important as they give meaning to
life and provide a base from which to take
action. However, as many have pointed out,
some of the stories that allowed social action
to take place in the past were simple linear
stories that proposed one major problem,
with one major cause (or scapegoat) and one
major path of action. Some of the narratives
currently available are similarly dogmatic,
more about exclusion than about belonging,
and close off the possibility of openness,
adaptation and engagement with complexity.
In the end, these kinds of stories will not
allow us to confront the global challenges
we face as they do not allow an active
engagement with change.
he young people I worked with during the
workshop seemed neither willing, nor able,
to believe in these closed stories. his might
make social action harder, but it allows space
for newer (although they will likely draw on
elements from older narratives) and more
open narratives of social action to emerge,
stories that allow engagement with a complex
world. hese could emerge, or maybe already
have, in a number of places. he political
leadership is one, and it is important to have
leaders who can rebuild these young people’s
trust in politics. Another is amongst young
people themselves. I believe an important
task for youth research is to be open for, and
supportive of, these new stories of action
and engagement emerging amongst young
people. To do this well, researchers, including
myself, may need to be more open with our
own ideas of what it means to take action to
shape the future.
Workshop data
Personal hopes – by one small group
For my job to not be the only thing in my life
To be successful
To be happy
To have somewhere to live
To have traveled
To have gone wild a bit
To be alive
To have an adventure
To not have a dull routine
To still have good friends
To live in the jungle
To wake up somewhere different each morning
To party lots, meet people, experience everything – except dying – Things I’ll gain stuff
To not be stressed
To have a sweet partner
To have a friend with benefits – a relaxed relationship (without stress of ‘all the strings’)
To have a pet
When I’m old I want to settle down
From what I’ve seen, kids ruin lives
I don’t want to bring a kid into the world in 20 years
It seems depressing not to have kids
The hopes and fears of young Australians
37
Julian’s story
Julian Waters-Lynch (age 26: research interest:
globalisation, developmental psychology,
education and social change)
I was very grateful to be able to spend the
day in creative engagement with the twentyodd young students who attended the day.
It taught me a lot about teaching and group
interaction with young people, and in many
ways my response will be coloured through
thinking around pedagogy, content and the
school system.
Diversity and group dynamics
Immediately, as is often the case with the
group, I was struck by the diversity of
personality types and stages of physical and
mental development of the group. In light
of the panel discussions after the students
left for the day, I think this is a key point to
remember and honour. I fully understand
the usefulness of making general statements
about a class or group, even a generation.
However I also believe that some of the
cursory conclusions generated by simply
observing the theatrical ‘snapshots’ would
mask the complexity of thinking that
students were able to perform.
I notice a tendency in group dynamics,
particularly amongst school children, for a
‘centre of gravity’ of group understanding to
emerge. his average ability for expressing
complexity of ideas will misrepresent the
more advanced thinkers of the group, and
equally ‘pull up’ the understanding of those
at the bottom. It is as if the micro-culture
of the group becomes established. Certainly
the three university students injected into
the mix a deeper capacity for reflection and,
in one case, a commitment to a political
philosophy for action beyond most of the
school students.
I make this point in part as an expression
of my own frustration both at working as
a facilitator with larger groups, and within
‘student-centred’ philosophical frameworks.
38
On one level, I am highly sympathetic to
Neil Postman’s (1969) challenge to educators
to ‘never ask questions one already knows
the answer to’, especially in its implications
that learning is a journey for adults, children,
teachers and students alike. On the other
hand, I find myself very at ease with many
traditional and pre-industrial cultural
practices of respect for the ‘wisdom of the
elders’, and the importance of actually (even
passively) absorbing information from
those who have experience in a domain of
knowledge. When working as a facilitator
with young people, there are many instances
where I’ve felt it appropriate to move towards
a more traditional didactic exchange for a
time.
Pedagogy
I understand that the aim of the day was
not so much to impart knowledge to the
students, as provide an opportunity to
learn from their own perceptions of the
world and their place in it. Nevertheless at
times the exercises presented difficulties in
moving forward without basic foundational
knowledge of economics, history, governance
and civics – subjects that should be
covered in SOSE (Studies of Society and
Environment). One example came up
when we were reading the letters to a world
leader. One of the girls began reading her
letter’s recommendation that John Howard
should lower petrol prices, and I asked her
if he could do that as part of his job. She
didn’t know but appeared interested in the
answer. At that point we began to discuss
government taxes on fuel and the associated
government revenue at which point she asked
if John Howard personally got that money.
Considering we had just finished an activity
involving designing a project for local action
to address local or global problems, in other
words civic engagement as a fundamental
expression of a healthy democratic society,
conflation between the role of a Prime
Minister in a Westminster System with
some sort of oil baron dictator (whatever one
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
thinks of Howard) is problematic to say the
least. It seemed like an appropriate time for
some basic lessons, however I also recognise
that the activities so far were instrumental
in getting the student to ask the questions
in the first place. I can’t help but long to see
schools and teachers not just associating
progressive pedagogical frameworks with
drama and creative self expression but also
as an effective mechanism for imparting
‘traditional’ knowledge areas.
Multiple skills and abilities
All discussion and reflections on the
day, including the previous points, are
limited by a lack in common language
to discuss various dimensions of human
development. For me this was highlighted
when we imagined a group of kids going
through the same workshop 50 years ago.
It was suggested that they might have had
a more grounded political identity (even
assuming this is a good thing) and may
have known more about avenues for civic
engagement. he veracity of this claim is
one question, but regardless of the answer,
it neglects discussion of a range of other
skills, including emotional intelligence,
communicative freedom, creative ability etc.
Howard Gardner (1983) has been writing
about ‘multiple intelligences’ since at least
1983, which provide some way of explaining
how individuals might be highly developed
in one area – say interpersonal and musical
ability – and highly underdeveloped in
another area – say mathematical and spatial
intelligence. My hunch is we’re seeing
cultural terrain that develops some areas
more highly, but perhaps neglects others. If
we simply assess these kids on knowledge of
civics and history we can come to a certain
conclusion. But I think this is too close to the
‘deficit model’ often spoken of in community
development. We need to remember the
multiple forms of literacy displayed through
the activities on the day. I would have loved
to see a group of adults engaging in the same
The hopes and fears of young Australians
kind of challenges: how do you express a
tangible action for social change in a four
person ‘freeze frame statue’ with five minutes’
preparation time?
A few thoughts about generational
characteristics
In the discussion I considered the difference
between my experience as a 26 year old, and
many of these 15 year olds. he students
were mostly 15-16 years, and I was that age
in 1995-1996. It is easy to over-estimate
the role of political leadership. However I
do think the rhetoric around vision for the
future at the time of the Hawke/Keating
government left a mark on me. I distinctly
remember debate around Australia’s future
as a multicultural republic at a time when I
was just awakening to the effect of macropolitical and cultural forces on my life. I
think in part the genius of Howard’s political
success has been a mastery of reserve in
‘big picture’ vision and radical changes. It
seems that he has championed the cause
and legitimacy of everyday Australian
mums and dads, going about their everyday
affairs. It strikes me as amazing (if not
scary) that these kids have spent most of
their life under such a political figure. With
very little experience of radical changes as
espoused by a leader (leaving aside the GST
and industrial relations) in areas related to
their concerns – global warming, nuclear
disarmament, water conservation, lack of
civil liberties – it makes sense to me that
change is left to the area of Hollywood
fantasy and computer assisted imagination
in many of their minds. I think the political
context of their experience is easy for many
older people, even myself, to forget.
39
Workshop data
Fears for the shared future – by one small group
Running out of resources, eg oil
More/less welcoming of asylum seekers
Environmental degradation and climate change
The effects of global warming, eg rising water
That the amazing people doing great things will be outnumbered and overpowered by the
greedy, selfish people
Not being able to do anything or change anything
Fear of not succeeding in life
Globalisation of current system of capitalism: inequality, poverty, exploitation, self-interest,
disturbed conception of what life really means, is worth
Increasing conflict in the Middle East
Ani’s story
Ani Wierenga (age 38: research interests
include the connections between young people
and their communities, people’s active social
participation, and storying)
In the Youth Futures workshop, participants
talked about personal futures, shared
futures, fears and hopes. One theme that
emerged early in the day was the disconnect
between everyday lives and bigger concerns
(war, ecological destruction, running out of
water) between what comes in view when
people talk about personal futures and what
comes to the fore when talking about shared
futures. Almost like a lens set to a different
focus, it seems very hard to keep both in
clear view at once. Of the big picture, young
people said:
It crosses my mind every now and then.
Other things [I’m] looking at rather than
worrying about that.
I never worry about it really except when
everyone’s talking about it – but I do
worry about it.
One wrote later:
Our future is a very interesting topic. It
is something that can often be drummed
out of our minds by the demands of the
present.
40
On the day, one high school participant
explained it this way:
One of the things I sometimes worry
about corrupt government, terrorism,
wars and everything, and that’s what
you see on the news and hear that it’s
definitely going to happen, but then you
just walk down the street and see some
old lady feeding birds, and you think of
all the things that are close to you, and
usually they are just good, and we get
blinded, and just kind of forget – get
blinded by other things.
At the time I was not sure whether he was
saying that the big picture was a distraction
from the everyday, or the everyday was a
distraction from the big picture. (Now I am
wishing I had the wits about me to ask.)
Whichever the case, both sentiments echo
the findings of other research. In project 1,
Eckersley et al (2006a) discussed how mediabased narratives can create a distortion of
life. Meanwhile, research on young people’s
lives (eg Dwyer et al 2005) reveals that
against quite bleak backdrops, young people
can hold very positive views about their own
futures.
Participants noted the disconnection
between the scope of problems and
solutions: [It’s] a lot easier to criticise what’s
wrong but harder to find out what we can do.
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
Some people talked about feeling powerless:
Everyone worries about it but in reality there
is nothing we can do about it. Some young
people also saw the urgent need to do
something:
I think a lot of the idea about resources
being taken over and we think about
that, and we try to think now about how
we’re going to deal with it then – really
we should be looking for ways to prevent
it.
One young person explained:
he things I worry about most are like
either not being able to do something
or no one else wanting to do something
about it...
Participants also shared some effectively
communicated take-home messages, or
personal sound-bites: Don’t litter, don’t be
prejudiced, have shorter showers. Each of these
is a ‘micro’ solution to the ‘macro’ problems
they identified (ecological destruction, war,
water). hey are also very atomised and
individualised solutions. Panel members
noticed that in media, education and public
forums there seemed to be fewer readily
accessible sound-bites about shared solutions
or things folks could do together. he panel
discussed how young people are growing
up in a context that individualises: the
individual alone is responsible for finding
solutions. A growing body of local and
international research suggests this pattern
affects all ages – not only young people – but
these young people are constructing lives in
the middle of it.
his is a ‘what can one person do’ dilemma.
Tackling it is about claiming ‘agency’, or
one’s capacity to act in and on the world, in
the face of counter-messages that can make
people feel helpless. In the context of some
of the more threatening problems facing
humanity, a wise adage advises people to
‘think globally and act locally’. It will be
important to develop models and processes
where communities can better educate,
The hopes and fears of young Australians
prepare and support each other to do just
that.
Particularly in the later part of the day, the
group’s attention turned to hope. Young
people’s comments showed that hope was
strongly related to firstly being heard,
and secondly hearing each other. hey
highlighted the importance of the respectful
conversation between themselves and the
panel members:
Really liked today – all the adults
– respect – don’t really get that terribly
often – really appreciate it.
No one got told off and everyone was
respected.
heir reflections highlight the importance of
creating safe spaces for stories to emerge, and
again reinforce the message that a story will
grow when somebody trusted is listening:
I’ve learned new things about different
aspects of how people think and I’m
actually thinking more about the world,
and how we can be better off with the
world.
I have been questioning what to do with this
trust, and particularly how to write about the
conversation. In his work around narrative
processes and transformation, Michael
White (2000) highlights the importance of
witnesses. I am wondering about appropriate
rules of engagement, when the witnesses
are mostly researchers, not therapists. Also,
possibilities are different for on-going
relationships than for one-off encounters, or
conversations that continue on paper. How
do I write the things that these young people
say, with my own critical/sociological agenda,
while honouring that trust?
During the day when ideas were mirrored,
when witnesses richly re-storied what they
had seen and heard, the depth of what
was being talked about seemed to grow
exponentially. For example, unpacking a
drama, this conversation unfolded:
41
YP: [We were exploring] being told
what to do like you have no say in it.
Michael: I was interested that the way
power was being represented seemed to
have very little personality or real face –
it was almost they seemed a bit powerless
too – was that part of the decision?
Helen: Would you like to comment on
that?
YP: One of our themes that we were
talking about was like to do with um
global systems and whatever – it’s like
distortion of what life means and like
your perception of life ... in the power
relations and that way of life, you forget
that you are a person alive, trying to live
a life, and so instead of thinking about
the life, you think about work and getting
money ...
Helen: Do you have more general
worries that there could be pressures to
get dehumanised?
YP: Yes.
Beyond appreciating engagement with the
adults, the young people’s feedback also
highlighted the importance of hearing each
other: A chance to learn from other people
– [we] don’t know what each other think. his
sense of having shared concerns seems to be
a powerful antidote to the individualising
forces that surround. As the things that
worry individuals are discussed, personal
problems become shared issues (see Mills
1959). All this talking, playing and listening
create links across the gap we identified
between the personal and the collective. One
of the young people explained:
One thing I realised – when you talk to
a group like this – [we’re] worried how
the world is going to turn out and wars
and that’s how it’s almost going now
– but that’s when it’s run by a different
generation. All us people make the
choices of how the future will be –
hearing the opinions and what we believe
in, its not necessarily going to be like that
– that’s given me a different outlook.
Workshop data
Actions to build a preferred future – by two small groups
Understanding of all opinions
Being supportive
Recycle shower water
Short shower
Acts of kindness
Recycling
Don’t litter
Expressing opinions
Non-supportive of prejudice
VOTING
Turn off lights when you’re not using them. Fix dripping taps
Be more aware, and change
More charity runs
Write issues that need attention; cut out propaganda
Quick articles for newspapers and such about the problems that need help fixing
Don’t get people in your habits
Don’t advertise your own bad habits
Could look like: people helping others, helping the environment, working in groups to, maybe
make a difference (advertise the right thing)
Be the change that you want to see.
42
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
Another commented that they were: Actually
[just?] getting started. In her evaluation sheet,
one young woman explained: although it was
supposed to help the organisers ... I think it
helped every person that attended.
Michael Apple (1996) writes about how
individuals (citizens) become reduced to
mere economic players under certain forms
of governance. He highlights the importance
of engaging in ‘politics of interruption’,
creating processes or claiming moments to
question these social forces. He identifies
education as a key site for this action. It has
been interesting to reflect on the workshop
as a process of interruption. Perhaps what
workshop participants were doing together,
for a brief moment, was interrupting some of
the forces that individualise and dehumanise,
and that render people isolated or helpless to
act and create change.
So the young people identified the
importance of respectful conversation about
the future, being heard, adult listeners,
witnesses, co-learners, safe spaces to speak,
and opportunities to hear each other. hey
pointed to a sense of collectivity which led
to a sense of hope. hey also highlighted
that these things were a departure from their
everyday experiences.
he experience also leaves me wondering
about other possible sites for interruptions to
dehumanising, individualising forces. How
might these powerful processes identified
by the young people be more incorporated
into life, community and education? Rather
than simply laying this demand on schools,
education can be seen as a process that
happens inside and outside schools, for
young people and adults (life-long, formal
and informal settings). here are some
ongoing projects that do exactly this, for
example NGOs who work in partnership
with schools, and I recognise in a new way
the importance of what these folks are
doing. he listening extends over time to
experiential learning, local action or global
The hopes and fears of young Australians
John’s reflection
‘John’ (Year 10 Drama student)
On the 29th August, I was invited on an
excursion of the Year 10 Drama class to
go to Melbourne University. I accepted
the offer of course, not only because it
was on a Tuesday, but because the idea of
researching what people my age thought
about the future appealed to me, and a lot
of my friends were doing it.
Nathan and I caught the train there
together; at first we were confused as to
where the graduate house was, but we
eventually found it. It was a lot more classy
than what it looked from outside – quite
modern!
Nathan and I were two of the first students
there, and we got to talk to some former
Seaside High School students; they were
really nice and friendly to talk to.
About half an hour later, everyone had
arrived and we got the show on the road.
I met a few other new people; some flew
from Canberra and Sydney just to talk to
us, a group of High School students.
All the people there were very interesting.
It was good to hear different points of
views and similar ideas to mine. It was
sort of reassuring that I wasn’t the only
teenager that thought about oil prices
and global warming and war and not just
what’s happening on the weekend.
Most of the work we did was in groups
of four or five and we made freeze frames
to represent different possibilities for
the future and how we could change the
future. A lot of the stuff we did was group
discussion, on how different people and
groups interpreted different freeze frames.
All in all, I think everyone had an
enjoyable day: it was definitely worth it
– it was a lot of fun. hanks Michael for
the invite!
43
relationships. hese processes are not
optional extras, not nice youth participation
projects for organisations’ decoration or
young people’s entertainment, but central
to claiming human agency and citizenship.
his is about learning, recognising, knowing
and feeling one’s capacity to act in, and on,
the world. When facing the future, exploring
effective processes is not an optional extra,
but a central part of the work that lies ahead.
Richard’s story
Richard Eckersley (age 59: research interests
include futures, progress, health and wellbeing,
and young people)
A couple of years ago, my son, then aged
about 18, and I were watching SBS World
News (it was on after the comedy, Pizza,
which he enjoyed). An item about the
humanitarian crisis in Darfur, Sudan,
began. ‘Can we turn this off, Dad?’ my son
asked. ‘Yeah, sure,’ I replied, ‘but why?’ ‘It’s
depressing,’ he said. ‘I don’t need reminding
what a horrible place the world is.’
he bleak view of the world and its
future held by many young people, which
I encountered when working with the
Commission for the Future almost 20 years
ago, first aroused my interest in their health,
and then in progress and wellbeing more
broadly. he issue was then, and remains,
often misunderstood. Most young people,
like most older people, are optimistic about
their personal futures. Having concerns
about the future of the world does not mean
being morose or dejected, or even thinking
a lot about it. And, as pointed out in the
section on future visions and wellbeing,
people can respond quite differently to the
concerns.
In the 1988 Commission for the Future
study (cited elsewhere in this report), the 53
per cent of respondents who were pessimistic
about the future of humanity were asked if
their concerns ‘in general diminish or reduce
your enjoyment of life’ (Eckersley, 2000).
44
Only 2 per cent said ‘very much’ and 13 per
cent ‘quite a lot’, while 48 per cent said ‘not
much’ and 35 per cent ‘not at all’ (still, this
means 63 per cent of this group claimed they
were personally affected).
Future fears no doubt impact most on
those who are already psychologically
vulnerable, magnifying their personal
problems by making them seem part of a
far larger predicament. Less directly and
more commonly, however, these concerns
can reinforce a self-focus and political
disengagement that are also encouraged
by growing individualism and materialism.
And this orientation has implications
for wellbeing, social as well as personal.
Ultimately, it can sap people’s will to address
global issues – unless their concerns can be
harnessed to produce social change. And
this ‘activation’ depends in turn on how the
concerns are embodied in the narratives of
people’s lives, especially whether people are
cast as passive observers or active players in
the larger picture.
Being heard
For most of the students who participated
in the workshop, the stand-out feature of
the experience seemed to be that they were
listened to and, importantly, listened to with
respect. hey also clearly enjoyed being able
to discuss and play out their fears and hopes
about the future. his finding supports that
of earlier, more extensive research (Eckersley,
1999, 2002; Gidley, Bateman & Smith,
2004). heir gratitude for the experience
raises the question of how often this happens
– within schools and families and amongst
peers.
As discussed in the first project report
(Eckersley, Wierenga & Wyn, 2006a), young
people need to be able to create stories or
narratives that allow them to make sense of
the world and their lives. his is important
to their wellbeing and to Australia’s future.
he opportunity to talk about the world and
themselves is an essential ingredient of this
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
story-making. Yet the students’ reactions hint
at the absence of opportunity.
Society needs to consider to what extent
family life (with its work-life pressures,
structured activities and media distractions),
education (with its curriculum demands),
friendships (with a focus around
entertainment), and the media (increasingly
intrusive) are no longer allowing the time
for the reflection and conversations needed
for creating stories. Young people are, of
course, exposed to huge numbers of stories,
some of which reflect ages-old themes and
myths. However, to a large extent, they do
not inhabit these stories. However much
they might identify with the characters,
these are not personal narratives that provide
storylines connecting them to the wider
world and the future.
he first report noted among its key findings
the need ‘for communities to claim space for
conversations about things of value; and to
allow time for reflection, for asking questions
as well as seeking solutions’. he workshop
affirmed this need, specifically in relation
to the future young people will inherit and
shape.
Disconnections
he workshop students were aware of
national and global issues and problems,
but most appeared to feel they did not
have the personal capacity to do anything
about them. he task was momentous, the
proposed remedies trivial; there was little
sense of collective or political agency. his
was, for the research panel, a striking feature
of the workshop, one which very likely flows
from the lack of opportunities to create
narratives that connect personal stories to
social histories. his is hardly surprising:
the gulf between the magnitude of the
challenges facing humanity and the scale
of its responses runs right through society
to include the activities of government and
other major institutions.
The hopes and fears of young Australians
At a time when there is growing attention
and debate on policy and technological
responses to terrorism, global warming
and other threats, the importance of the
subjective and intangible is often overlooked.
Yet these dimensions are crucial to the
development of adequate, effective responses.
he focus is on the ‘hard’ issues of economic
instruments and technological innovation,
but, ultimately, it is the ‘soft’ aspects of life
– values, beliefs, stories – that are more
important.
Generational shifts?
Several recent studies and commentaries
have suggested that today’s youth, Gen Y, are
more optimistic about the future than their
predecessors. Adapted to a globalised, hightech world, knowing only economic stability
and prosperity, they are ‘fearless and flexible’
(Saulwick Muller 2006). In contrast to
Generation X, Huntley (2006) says, ‘Yers are
a happy, well-behaved and optimistic bunch
... his is a healthy demographic, reporting
low levels of psychological distress.’
his portrait of youth is neither new nor
complete (Eckersley, 1997, 2002). his
project – especially the survey results – does
not support this view of a generational
shift in optimism. he surveys span (late)
Boomers, Gen X and Gen Y. hey show
that, whatever changes in ‘style’ there may
have been, these generations have been
overwhelmingly optimistic about their
personal futures, and they are more likely
than not to be pessimistic about national
and global futures. Nor, contrary to what
Huntley (2006) suggests, do young people
appear to have more faith today than in
the past that science and technology will
provide solutions to humanity’s difficulties.
If anything, young people’s concerns about
the world have deepened, a hardly surprising
development given both the current and
emerging realities of global terrorism,
climate change and other threats, and their
intensifying media coverage.
45
Dave’s reflection
‘Dave’ (Year 10 Drama student)
On Tuesday, August the 29th, a group of
people from Seaside High School went to
Melbourne University to attend a study
on what young people think the future
may hold. here were roughly 20 students
from school, and about seven adults,
that had come from all over Australia to
conduct the study.
We arrived at the university at 9:15, and
were taken into a room where a woman
called Helen (the person in charge of
the seminar) told us why we were there;
following that, we did a Mexican wave,
saying our name when we stood up.
When the adults came into the room, we
each said a little bit about ourselves, and
did the Mexican wave again.
he first proper activity that we did was
to improvise and perform a small scene on
parental pressure regarding kids’ choices
in VCE. Each group of two then played
the scene again, but this time swapped
roles. Once a few of the scenes had been
shown to the rest of the group, we had
a discussion on what we think drives
parents to pressure their kids, and what
pressures there may be.
After the discussion, we made new
groups, this time of four or five people.
We were then instructed to brainstorm
a few ideas of where we would like to see
ourselves in five years. After that, we were
asked to create a small freeze frame (small
movements were allowed), showing one
of the ideas in detail. his was followed
by a discussion on what these scenes may
mean, and then finally recess.
As we filed out of the room into the eating
area, we saw tea, coffee, and an assortment
of biscuits that we helped ourselves to.
Once satisfied, we moved back into the
room where we continued the study. his
46
time, we were asked to put ourselves
into different groups again. We then
brainstormed ideas about what we were
scared that the future might turn out
like, and then put it into a short play.
Our group came up with a scene showing
a severe water shortage, terrorism, and
a big brother type world where the
government controls everything. As
each group showed their scene, the rest
of the people tried to work out what it
meant, and what the ideas were that were
brainstormed.
As this took a little bit longer than
expected, it was lunchtime after the scenes
were performed. Just like before, we
moved out into the eating area where this
time we saw sandwiches, cut into little
triangles. Not many people could figure
out what exactly was in the sandwiches,
but they tasted great all the same.
After lunch, we went back into the room
and did basically the same thing, but this
time we were talking about our hopes for
the future. After we had brainstormed our
ideas, we were to show each one in a two
second freeze frame, one after the other.
hese scenes were titled, so little discussion
was needed to work out what they meant.
Once that was finished, we formed a
big circle, and, one by one, told the rest
of the group what they liked about
the day. hen everybody was given a
certificate, and a movie pass to say thank
you for being part of the study. We were
dismissed from the University at 3:00.
All in all, the day was a lot of fun, and
I learned a lot of stuff that I wouldn’t
have thought about otherwise. I talked
to people that I wouldn’t normally talk
to, and went home feeling like I had
accomplished something. he end of the
day seemed to drag on a little bit, but it
was a day off school, and a worthwhile
one at that.
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
Beneath the different readings of
generational attributes and attitudes to the
future swirls a complex mix of disciplinary
perspective and tensions, as the first project
report highlighted. hese also emerged in
the research panel discussions in this project.
Huntley (2006) says she has tried her best
to avoid the tendency of older people to
see young people as ‘a problem that needs
fixing’. Defending young people against social
criticism and control is a recurring theme in
youth studies. he danger in this approach is
that it risks glossing over real concerns, such
as the adverse trends in young people’s health
and wellbeing, and, as a result, downplays the
fact that there are problems that affect young
people that ‘need fixing’. In other words,
young people are not the problem; what is
causing problems among young people is.
he complexities of this question were
discussed in detail in the first report
(Eckersley, Wierenga & Wyn, 2006a).
his project provides further evidence that
discourses framed around generational
differences, even ‘wars’, have at best a limited
validity. In today’s world, what unites
generations is far bigger than what divides
them.
Janet’s story
Janet McCalman (age 58: social and medical
historian)
he day spent with the ‘Seasiders’ was one
of mixed emotions. Coming in ‘cold’, as an
outsider, unfamiliar with the school and
its community, I was at first overwhelmed
with a feeling that these young people
have been let down by their education,
especially by the part for which I bear some
responsibility. hat is SOSE (Studies of
Society and Environment) which includes
history, geography, economics, politics and
environmental studies and which above all
is the study area that needs to prepare them
for their future as citizens not just of this
country, but of the world. According to at
least one of the students, this day spent in
The hopes and fears of young Australians
the Youth Futures workshop was found more
interesting than the SOSE class it replaced
on a Tuesday.
On paper, the list of their concerns for
the future was sophisticated and aware of
the world, but the content of their roleplaying – which was admirably spontaneous
– was troubling. Its sources were not their
schooling, but the external popular culture
they inhabited outside of school – a largely
digital culture driven by commercial agendas.
his is not suggesting that their formal
education should provide the dominant
content of their minds, and it was very clear
that the ‘Seasiders’ were critical young people
who were far from passive consumers of
Hollywood and its ubiquitous offspring.
Somehow their SOSE classes were not
relevant.
However much the Prime Minister calls
for better ‘history in schools’ that would
unequivocally serve a narrow, nationalistic
agenda, this does not mean that we back
away from teaching thoughtful, critical
and rich content to our students. Part of
the problem is that the SOSE teacher’s
classroom story is competing with the
powerfully told stories of commercial media.
It is very difficult to provide a classroom
story that is compelling and absorbing
– particularly in a subtle history like
Australia’s.
However when we fail to teach young people
history or SOSE in a progressive program
that matches their emotional and intellectual
development, then we deprive them of the
understanding of how the world works
that can give them a map for the future.
It’s like sending people out the door into
a wilderness without a compass or guide.
How can they think about the things that
concern them for the future if they have not
the least idea of how people in the past dealt
with things, made change, agitated, fought,
criticised, and used new tools? hey cannot
expect to start from scratch, with a blank
47
slate. hey need to be able to do better than
conceptualise dangerous executive power on
a global scale as an ‘American Hitler’. If they
cannot begin to learn how to think about the
world and learn from the collective human
experience that is history, then they are being
thrust into life without the most important
intellectual tools they will need for survival.
A new book on how some young people
can find their way, Out of the Woods: tales
of resilient teens, by Stuart Hauser, Joseph
Allen and Eve Golden (2006), reveals
the importance of history-making as the
sense-making of suffering in recovery from
adolescent psychosis. It was the ability to
reshape personal narratives into increasingly
complex, rich and structured (or ‘smooth’)
personal histories that distinguished the
few that got themselves ‘out of the woods’.
By analysing these narratives in comparison
with others who demonstrated less resilience,
the authors were able to observe over time
– from ages 12 through to 25 – how what is
essentially historical thinking emerged as the
process of building resilience, of somehow
‘turning on’ the resilience gene through
cognitive growth.
During an earlier skirmish in the History
Wars, a psychiatrist responded to one of
my Age columns with the observation that
what the suicidal young people he saw lacked
most of all, was a sense of history. How can
a sense of history increase your resilience
in the face of discouragement and despair?
Indeed, what distinguishes suicidal young
people is their inability to imagine the future:
that’s why they want to die – they cannot
see how they can live, what they can do, how
it could possibly turn out. To imagine the
future, we need to have signposts of ways
forward, and those we learn from experience,
both personal and vicarious. And the formal
as well as the informal study of history can
be regarded as tapping into collective or
vicarious human experience. You cannot
develop a map for the future unless you have
some knowledge and perspective on how
48
human beings have put the world together in
the past.
Two American historians, Roy Rosensweig
and David helen have interviewed
1400 American adults – 600 of them
Afro-Americans, Mexican Americans or
Sioux – about how they make history
inside their own heads, how they find
meaning in the past in their everyday
lives. A majority of these people feel
a powerful sense of engagement with
the past, but overwhelmingly theirs is a
familial and intimate historicity. hey are
not uninterested in large events – on a
community, national or global scale. But they
connect with the march of history through
private experience of those large historical
events – if you like, private history amidst
the public.
However, the least likely to privatise history
in this way are Afro-Americans and Sioux
Indians and, to the authors’ surprise, it
is the Afro-Americans who have most
preserved the progressive narrative of
American History, ‘albeit not in its most
easily recognisable forms’. Ray Rosenszweig
(2000) continues: ‘To a startling degree black
Americans constructed a story of progress
when they looked at the past – a rather
traditional story that was hard to find among
white Americans.’ And they are far more
likely than whites to describe change for the
better. Here we see, for both Afro-Americans
and Amerindians, the making of a history
that is enabling for the individual as well as
for the group, even if it is unrecognisable to
many professionals.
All of this challenges us as writers and
teachers, argues David helen, ‘to pay more
attention to individuals both as interpreters
of and actors in the past’, and rely less on our
preferred protagonists – abstracted actors in
groups, communities, classes, and nations.
helen (2000) confesses:
...our respondents were challenging me
to see history as a tension between large
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
events and circumstances that shape the
range within which people think and act
on the one hand, and the tremendously
active and varied ways that individuals
tried to meet intimate needs, on the other.
Even more challenging was what the
respondents said they wanted school
history to do for their children, and that
was nothing less, in fact, than preparing
them for adult life: not quite making them
good American citizens, but rather, effective,
autonomous people who believed that they
had some control over their destiny. his
was revealed by the way they constructed
historical narratives in their own lives, where
people often assembled isolated experiences
into narratives or trajectories. From these
narratives ‘they could project what might
happen next, set priorities, and try to take
responsibility for the future course of events.’
And, fascinatingly, ‘the rhythms of family
life, often the responsibility parents felt to
prepare their children for what lay ahead,
inspired the narratives they found to explain
change and continuity in the larger world’.
hus they made the connection between
private history and public history, but the
essential part of that link was their need to
affirm personal agency in their own lives and
in the wider world.
helen concludes from reviewing the
testimony of this wide sample of American
parents: ‘he past thus becomes a vast
reservoir for exploring to what extent and
under what circumstances and with what
support individuals might be able to shape
the course of events, whether of alcoholism
in themselves or racism in the larger society’.
Jane’s reflection
‘Jane’ (Year 10 Drama student)
I got the opportunity to interact with
people I wouldn’t usually interact with.
I also got to interact with people I
usually interact with, but in a different
environment. Everyone’s needs were
catered for throughout the day.
Everybody took part productively. Free
food :) It was good to hear people’s
perspectives on very serious issues we
are facing today. I enjoyed the active
learning environment; I would like if
our school undertook more of this. I
enjoyed working with Helen, she was
a very lovely woman, and she put a
lot of effort in to making our day go
smoothly. I would like very much if we
kept in touch with her.
Everyone got along with each other
very well. It was great working with the
adults involved as well.
concealing individual agency, we perhaps
can break many youthful hearts who need to
believe that the world is worthwhile and that
they have a purposeful place in it, and that
it is possible to bring about change. But how
do we teach that to young people both in
schools and universities? his is in fact one
of the most difficult intellectual problems
in the humanities and social sciences: the
relationship between the individual and his
or her agency in the course of events, and the
larger social forces that shape the world.
What the American parents and our
Melbourne psychiatrist are seeing in
good history teaching is the unlearning of
helplessness. One of the characteristics of
depression, particularly in the young, is
learned helplessness; that nothing you can
do can make any difference. And when we
teach history as abstracted to the point of
As a private individual, the past gives me
hope for the future in that it reinforces my
faith in the capacity of ordinary people
to strive for decency and fairness in the
world and to utilise new knowledge to solve
problems. Life goes on, in spite of the most
terrible events and transformations. And
young people need to be given that hope that
within ourselves we can make history even
The hopes and fears of young Australians
49
though the circumstances are never of our
own choosing.
he SOSE curriculum is therefore just as
important as literacy or mathematics, for
SOSE is learning how to go about the task
of living in the world from the collective
experience of others. Perhaps we need to
do much more work on theorising the role
of knowledge of the past and of others in
the building of reflexivity, perspective and
resilience in young people. And on the basis
of that theory, work towards a richer school
SOSE curriculum.
Jennifer’s story
Jennifer Gidley (age 50s: research interests
include youth and educational futures, spiritual
psychology, educational transformation and
evolution of consciousness)
hroughout the day of the youth futures
workshop, although I saw many things that
I could comment on, the most striking thing
that came to me and kept tapping on my
shoulder throughout the day, was a comment
made by Richard in the very first morning
session with the panel. He pointed out that
an unforeseen challenge in the overall process
of the Australia 21 research project was the
difficulties that arose from within the crossdisciplinary team, particularly when it came
to writing up the research. I was slightly
shocked to hear that even such a wellintentioned attempt at cross-disciplinary
research between close colleagues can be
problematic. Some of the major challenges
were that there may be contentious
issues around choices of methodology,
interpretation of findings and the challenges
in arriving at ‘multi-perspectival’ rather than
‘disciplinary perspectives’ in report writing.
As pointed out in the report Flashpoints
and Signposts: Pathways to success and wellbeing for Australia’s young people, these
methodological, interpretive and pragmatic
issues arise from disciplinary perspectives
being underpinned by deeper conceptual,
50
even philosophical, frameworks that can be
quite distinct.
However, tensions – ‘flashpoints’ –
remained because of different disciplines
often drawing on different conceptual
frameworks to interpret the evidence
... A push into inter-disciplinary work
means entering a newer territory that
requires its own process and conceptual
development. (Eckersley, Wierenga &
Wyn 2006a: 9)
I carried this surprise and slight perturbation
with me throughout the day as it tapped into
my own current research, which attempts
to take a transdisciplinary approach to
the evolution of consciousness. Observing
and participating throughout the day, I
was mindful of just how complex was
the diversity of contributions and how
challenging it would be to produce a metaperspective on the workshop via a report.
In addition to the dozen or so academic
researchers from a variety of disciplines,
there were some ex-students who were now
student teachers, as well as the young people
themselves, who were also identified as coresearchers. In my own internal dialogue and
the dialogue I had with several of the panel
throughout the day, I tried to grapple with
how some of the theories and methodologies
that I am drawing on in my research (eg
integral studies, futures studies, research
‘bricoleur’ship) might be able to inform a
cross-disciplinary study such as this.
A rather powerful insight came to me as we
reflected at the end of the day. I saw how well
we were all able to interrelate throughout
the day, in spite of our multiple perspectives,
because we were not just relating from
our ‘head knowledge’ but in an embodied
way (using our hearts and hands as well)
through the medium of drama and narrative.
I thought that perhaps we could draw an
analogy between this and the difficulties
that we sometimes have as academics,
professionals or researchers, because we
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
communicate mostly ‘head knowledge’
through discussion and text.
I wonder how different this might be if
we used other more integrated methods
that utilised, in addition to concepts, such
processes as drama, narrative, and other
artistic media. Since the workshop itself, I
have continued to explore this theme of the
challenges of cross-disciplinary research, and
have some brief pointers to make about what
it means to me in regard to the futures of
research potential.
From my perspective, the struggles of this
research group reflect a wider picture of
researchers attempting to come to grips
with what I see as an emerging new stage
of consciousness, referred to variously in
the research as ‘post-formal’, ‘post-rational’
or ‘integral’ consciousness (Gebser 1991,
Kincheloe & Steinberg 1993, Wilber
2000, Gidley 2006). he appearance of
potential new faculties of consciousness
arising globally is well reflected in the ‘crossdisciplinary turn’ in contemporary research
developments:
•
Teams of experts/researchers from
different disciplines coming together to
attempt to gain a broader understanding
of a complex issue;
•
Individual researchers drawing on a
range of disciplines in order to arrive at a
multi-faceted, broader understanding of
a complex issue; and
•
new challenges created by the complexities of
contemporary social issues, and to addressing
the ‘big picture’ dimensions of the 21st
century.
I would like to briefly point to some theories
and methodologies that might assist in going
beyond singular ‘disciplinary’ approaches and
enable new ways of thinking, researching
and writing about complex issues in these
complex times.
•
Holistic Perspectives and Integral heory.
An increasing disenchantment with
scientific reductionism, particularly
when it comes to researching complex
social issues, has led to a move towards
more holistic approaches to research and
praxis. Probably the most comprehensive
conceptual mapping that builds towards
an integral theory has been attempted by
contemporary philosopher Ken Wilber
(2000).
•
Depth Futures Methodologies. One of
the methodological approaches from the
futures studies field that I personally
find very valuable in terms of depth
analysis is the Causal Layered Analysis
(CLA), developed by Sohail Inayatullah
(2000). his methodological approach
has provided some valuable insights into
some of the issues underlying youth
suicide (Gidley 2005).
•
Intertextuality as a Writing Approach.
In terms of how we actually write up
cross-disciplinary research, the poststructuralist approach of intertextuality
honours both the complexity and
non-linearity of cross-disciplinary
research. Joe Kincheloe (2005) links
intertextuality and the ‘post-formal’
research called ‘bricolage’. He points out
that ‘all narratives obtain meaning not
merely by their relationship to material
reality but from their connection to other
narratives’.
•
Bricolage as Research Philosophy and
Methodology. Describing bricolage
Newer academic fields which embrace
a number of previously distinct
disciplinary areas, such as youth studies,
women’s studies, sustainability, futures
studies, complexity science and, more
recently, integral studies.
Challenges and creative futures of crossdisciplinarity
here are a number of challenges to the use
of cross-disciplinary approaches to research.
However, there are also theories and
methodologies that are better adapted to the
The hopes and fears of young Australians
51
as a ‘multimethod mode of research’,
Kincheloe (2005) links it to multidisciplinary research as it includes:
‘Ethnography, textual analysis,
semiotics, hermeneutics, psychoanalysis,
phenomenology, historiography,
discourse analysis combined with
philosophical analysis, literary analysis,
aesthetic criticism, and theatrical and
dramatic ways of observing and making
meaning.’ In my view this approach
seems to have particular relevance to the
writing up of the research for our project
as it involves the integration of multiple
voices and multiple perspectives.
As both an ending and a beginning ...
One of the most outstanding aspects of the
Australia 21 youth futures workshop for
me was the way that the young people were
able to relax and open up because they felt
that it was a safe, enabling environment.
he intention and ability of all participants
to let their traditional ‘boundaries’ become
permeable enabled a high level of crossdisciplinary and cross-generational
interaction. In these times of so much
complexity, and conflict, new methods of
breaking down barriers are so vital. What the
processes of the Australia 21 youth futures
workshop sparked in me is the realisation
that it is more urgent than ever for those of
us pushing into cross-disciplinary and even
transdisciplinary modes of research and
conceptualisation, to recognise and utilise the
range of emergent philosophical, theoretical
and methodological approaches available to
assist us to more broadly, deeply, sensitively
and rigorously, pursue our passions.
52
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
Implications
his project aimed to make a contribution to
our understanding of young people’s sense of
what the future holds for them. As described
above, an innovative methodology was
designed specifically to open dialogue across
traditional disciplinary and age boundaries
and to bridge the gap between the agendas
and preoccupations of academics and policymakers and those of ordinary young people.
We can draw a number of conclusions from
this project. We found congruence between
the expressions of the young people and
the wider bodies of research to suggest that
young people are growing up in a context
that individualises responsibility, but
offers few clear answers to the big picture
challenges – both geographic and temporal.
he young people who participated in this
project were interested to take an active
role in building a sustainable future, both
environmentally and socially, yet most found
it very difficult to name ways in which
they could personally contribute to a wider
agenda of constructing preferred futures and
actively link the personal to the local to the
global.
One panel member noted that young
people have grown up under the influence
of a national leadership that does not talk
about the future. Indeed, the scenarios
created by the young people depicted
political leadership as manipulative,
exploitative, self-interested, dehumanised
and concerned to deny the existence of
enduring challenges such as poverty and
inequality and environmental threat. heir
The hopes and fears of young Australians
representations of what they saw as ethically
bereft leadership were shown to be integrally
connected to feelings of helplessness or even
a sense of collective threat from ‘new’ external
factors such as social and environmental
change and difference.
he methodology highlighted the
importance of developing processes
that enable cross-disciplinary and intergenerational dialogue in a structured
way that promotes active listening, the
recognition of shared concerns and collective
responsibility for developing solutions.
he workshop demonstrated that these
structured processes can lead to hope, a sense
of possibility, and an interest in taking action.
Young people’s reflections on the workshop
reveal that they particularly value the
opportunity to engage seriously with older
people about ethical, social, political and
environmental issues. hey would like to be
heard by older people, but they also want to
hear what older people think. his provoked
us to ask, how does our society generally
provide the spaces within which young
and older people can engage in meaningful
dialogue?
We acknowledge we are drawing on just one
workshop with young people, and that we
need to do more research to develop this
work. However, the poll results suggest that,
broadly speaking, the workshop outcomes
are indicative of the views of many of their
generation. his is true not just of their
broad expectations of the future, but also
53
of some specific concerns. For example,
the students’ fears of authoritarian control
are reflected in the poll findings that
young people are more likely to agree that
governments will use new technologies to
watch and regulate people more than that
they will make democracy stronger and give
people more control over their lives.
Across all jurisdictions and policy areas, the
project highlighted the responsibility that
older people have to engage in dialogue with
young people as a two-way process, listening
to their views, providing young people with
responses to their questions and showing an
interest in jointly exploring answers in a time
and place that is relevant to young people.
In this section we draw on the findings of
the project to provide a synthesis of policy
implications. he project has demonstrated
that young people have the capacity to
provide views which challenge adult ways
of thinking and open up new approaches
to finding pathways to preferred futures.
It has some significant messages for all
those involved in the development and
implementation of youth policy, across all
jurisdictions, for the private sector and for
research. In particular, the young people in
this project revealed that they:
Policy implications
•
Have a strong sense of personal
responsibility for building positive
futures, for themselves and their society.
hey hold concerns about both personal
issues (for example, getting a good
job or doing well in their studies) and
about community and global issues (for
example, poverty, the environment and
terrorism), but feel relatively helpless
to address the ‘big picture’ issues and
disempowered beyond individual
responses;
•
Enjoy sharing and creating stories
from their own experience and hearing
those passed on through family and
community. Stories about overcoming
adversity and about hope for the future
are an important resource on which they
draw in solving their own problems and
in understanding how to take action; and
•
54
Find that a sense of agency, commitment
and hope is generated when they engage
in dialogue across the boundaries of age
groupings, location and expertise.
Ordinary young people have important
things to say, but know their voice is not
heard. Young people are usually positioned
as passive recipients of adult knowledge and
advice. In this project, they appreciated the
opportunity to ask questions of older people
and valued hearing about older people’s
experiences in an interactive context.
Many jurisdictions have responsibility for
different aspects of young people’s lives.
In terms of policy and governance, the
trinity of Education, Health and Juvenile
Justice are recognised as the dominant
three areas where policies and programs are
developed and enacted in young people’s
present interests, and on behalf of their
future lives. he young people in this study
highlighted that equal attention should be
given to environment policy as an arena of
significant import in relation to their futures.
In practice, environment is rarely considered
in relation to youth health, education or
employment. We also believe more attention
needs to be paid to the role of the media in
shaping young people’s views of the world
and its future and, more broadly, their own
lives and priorities.
In Australian Federal and State
Governments, responsibilities for youth
are broken down into many separate and
overlapping portfolios, including Offices
of Youth and Community Services. here
are periodic attempts to bring greater
coherence to the governance of young
people’s lives through inter-departmental
and inter-sectoral initiatives which bring
representatives of health, education and
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
justice together, in recognition of the need
to take a more holistic approach to young
people’s lives, and to enact ‘upstream’ policies
that are preventive rather than reactive.
Young people themselves are pointing out
that to work ‘upstream’ we must also take
a longer view of the future and encompass
a broader sense of what constitutes their
world. While this project has implications
across the breadth of policy arenas that relate
to young people, we highlight implications
for youth policy, education, media and the
environment.
here is a strong body of evidence that
supports the conclusion that while young
Australians are disengaged from the formal
political processes through which our society
is governed, they are active participants in
civic society in a wide range of ways (Vronen
2003). Participation in policy formation and
gaining an understanding of the contribution
that they can make to policy – and how
policy affects their lives – is a key component
of the governance process that would enable
young people to understand the links
between voting in elections and the policies
that govern their lives. While young people
do not necessarily see the things they are
concerned about as ‘politics’, engaging with
young people around issues that are relevant
to their lives would make a significant
contribution to developing ‘political literacies’
(Fyfe & Wyn 2006).
his project connects with other existing
work (eg Holdsworth 2003) to identify a
workable methodology for engaging young
people meaningfully in shaping policy and
taking action. Most youth policies derive
from a ‘top-down’ process, in which young
people have a relatively token involvement
in consultations. he diversity of their
voices is often washed out by aggregated
responses and they often have no role in
enacting policy. While there is an increasing
interest in youth participation in some areas
of government, especially through Offices
of Youth, this project suggests that there
The hopes and fears of young Australians
would be significant benefits in creating more
meaningful and widespread processes of
dialogue between adults and young people at
all stages of policy formation and enactment.
he issue of futures represents a ‘missing
link’ in these processes. To elaborate briefly,
many policies are enacted around a deficit
and individualised approach to young
people. Targets are set in order to reduce
the proportions of ‘vulnerable’ and ‘at-risk’
youth, or to ensure that individuals can
compete in the market place. his gives only
token recognition to the fact that social
conditions make some groups of young
people vulnerable to particular outcomes
at particular points in time, and fails to
recognise that deficits may reside within the
system rather than within the young person.
Vulnerability and risk are a function of
environmental conditions, social conditions
and relationships.
he individualised approach does little to
address the processes that create unequal
outcomes amongst young people, and
provides no way to address the more
significant questions: What sort of world
do we need to sustain life? What are we
aiming for? What are we responsible for?
What do enabling social structures, policies
and relationships look like? hrough its
focus on futures, this project provides an
approach towards a more coherent view of
the role of policy in informing structural
responses to shared problems. It highlights
the concern of young people with the interconnected nature of their own and their
society’s wellbeing and with their shared
dependence on (and responsibility for) a
‘well’ environment. It also underlines the
importance of giving greater priority to
involving young people in policy-shaping
processes.
Many of the policy issues raised here relate
equally to education. his project on youth
futures has significant implications for
education because young people are explicitly
55
there to prepare for their futures. Young
people are also expected to spend more
time than ever before within educational
institutions. here is an emerging sense,
however, that educational institutions have
been slow to respond to the changing nature
of youth and adulthood, and to pick up the
philosophical, ethical and practical concerns
that young people have with shaping their
shared futures. Educational processes and
structures continue to reflect the legacy
of their origins in the industrial world of
Australia in the 1950s. Today, young people
have token representation in education
policy and in decision-making within their
‘own’ institutions. While they are locked
into age-based, linear concepts of learning,
and held apart from roles of use or value
in their broader community, there is little
opportunity for action or for dialogue
between generations and across social groups.
Young people have the greatest stake in the
longer range view of the future and thus have
a particular interest in how environment
policy will shape the world that they live in.
It is not surprising then that they showed
a particular concern with the ethics that
informs environmental policy. It is here that
they were interested to see themselves as
shapers of change. It is here that they were
most interested to be given an arena for voice,
learning and action.
he following dot points provide a summary
of the main policy implications of the project
for the youth policy, education and other
policy areas.
Youth policy
•
Young people value the opportunity to
have dialogue about the important issues
that affect their lives, individually and
collectively, with adults who demonstrate
that they are listening.
•
Effective dialogue between generations
depends on the creation of effective
design (structure and process) through
which the talk can proceed and through
56
which different points of view and voices
can be recognised.
•
Effective dialogue includes the
opportunity to take action and effect
change.
•
Young people have particular concerns
that are age-specific, but they also
share many concerns with older people.
However, consultations with young
people are often limited to ‘youth
issues’ and result in policy frameworks
pertaining only to targeted areas of
‘at-risk’, ‘marginal’ or ‘vulnerable’ youth.
Offices for Youth (for example) could
play a greater role in advocating for
young people’s engagement in decisionmaking across the spectrum of policy
issues in which young people would
make a special contribution around:
◊ Visioning futures. In what is
currently a significant policy gap,
young people have a role to play in
contributing to debate about what
a good community and society
would look like in the future. his
issue has the potential to engage the
diverse narratives and perspectives
of Australians. In part, visioning the
future involves acknowledging stories
of achievement and hope from the
past, and most centrally, narratives
from indigenous communities, from
the historical waves of different
migrant groups and communities
and from refugee groups.
◊ Building futures. Young people
are important partners in building
futures – both through their active
engagement in meaningful policy
enactment and program delivery, and
through civic actions of their own
choice. he workshop demonstrated
the importance of drawing on new
approaches to youth participation
to work with young people in
partnership.
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
Education
Other policy areas
•
While it is difficult to address the
implications of this project in arenas not
directly or specifically concerned with youth,
we nonetheless felt that there were several
issues that warrant attention.
Young people have a real contribution to
make to the shaping of new educational
agendas. heir role in the key policy-making
organisations in government, in schools
and in professional organisations such as
Institutes of Teaching is under-estimated.
•
Young people have a significant
contribution to make in problem-solving
as well as problem-identification and
their role in effecting change and in
teaching and equipping peers to engage
in change-acts is yet to be fully imagined.
•
Greater inter-generational dialogue could
be fostered explicitly within a range of
curricula and be of mutual value to youth
and adults alike. In (important) arguments
about the need to hear ‘youth voices’, other
important notions of context, relationship
and dialogue can be lost. Young people
have highlighted the value of not only
speaking directly with adults but also of
hearing adults’ thoughts.
•
Narratives and stories are important
tools for making sense of the past, for
envisaging likely and alternative futures,
for identifying what is of value, and for
devising ways to act.
•
Interactive and innovative approaches to
dialogue and learning can assist young
people and their communities to build
a sense of the imperative and legitimacy
of taking action to build their preferred
future world.
•
his project would not have been
possible without the (unresourced)
support of the school. What resources
would it take to equip more schools to
build innovative partnerships involving
this kind of dialogue across generations
and sectors into their curricula?
•
It will be increasingly important to
explore possibilities for partnerships with
schools, and to recognise that education
happens in informal and formal settings.
The hopes and fears of young Australians
•
Young people value the opportunity for
spaces within which inter-generational
dialogue can be enacted, and within
which narratives of resilience, practice
and partnership can be constructed
around issues of shared concern. hey
are keen to find a meaningful role within
their communities and to find a way to
take action that is communal in both
focus and in design. he environment
is one issue which resonates with many
young people.
•
he mass media have enormous reach
and influence in shaping society’s
defining stories. Media impacts remain
a hotly contested topic of research. A
recent international review calls for a
risk-based approach that takes more
account of the complex, interactive and
indirect pathways by which the media
contribute to social issues (Millwood
Hargrave & Livingstone 2006). We note
that the Australian Communication
and Media Authority (ACMA 2006)
is currently conducting a major study
of electronic media use by children and
young people and its effects. Such studies
should include the role of the media in
shaping young people’s expectations of
the future.
Research
his trial of an innovative participatory
approach to researching youth futures
has a number of implications for further
research. he project has demonstrated the
value of employing drama as a structured
form of research enabling participants to
communicate across traditional (eg age
and expertise) barriers. In particular, it has
57
provided a process for opening up dialogue
on a notoriously difficult topic (futures),
enabling the collection of data that moved
beyond the stereotypical binary of optimism/
pessimism to produce an insight into a more
complex positioning of young people on this
topic.
he project has the following implications
for research:
•
Youth participation in research is a
realistic and effective concept, but it
requires a shift away from traditional,
adult-centred approaches (such as
interviewing, focus groups or surveys).
he project has also demonstrated the
relevance of ‘storying’ as part of the process
of creating images of feared and preferred
futures and of drama-based processes
as enabling a rehearsal for action. As the
workshop demonstrated, stories are part of
the ‘glue’ that holds a society together, and
that make it possible to take an active role in
shaping futures. Equally, the participatory
nature of the workshop process illustrated
the need for dialogue as a community
building strategy. he report highlights
the value of seeking qualitative data via
interactive and participatory research
processes in order to deepen, and in some
instances to shift, understandings generated
by statistical data. Most importantly, the
project has demonstrated the benefits
of involving young people directly in the
research process, enabling them to both
challenge and contribute to the insights and
views that academics and policy-makers have
developed.
•
Narratives and storying provide a useful
tool for understanding current situations,
for envisaging preferred directions, and
for generating a sense of how to achieve
change.
58
Further research extending this project is
warranted. he research methodology should
be deployed within the framework of a
larger, systematic research program involving
workshops with diverse groups of young
people, adults and ‘experts’. he purpose of
this would be to build a more systematic
picture of how different communities can
create visions of the future and build more
effective pathways towards those futures.
Generations in Dialogue about the Future:
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