Building consensus and increasing self-efficacy: participatory scenarios as a tool for developing food security solutions in West Africa (original) (raw)
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Futures
The potential of participatory scenario processes to catalyse individual and collective transformation and policy change is emphasised in several theoretical reflections. Participatory scenario processes are believed to enhance participants' systems understanding, learning, networking and subsequent changes in practices. However, limited empirical evidence is available to prove these assumptions. This study aimed to contribute to this knowledge gap. It evaluates whether these outcomes had resulted from the scenario planning exercise and the extent to which they can contribute to transformational processes. The research focused on a district level case study in rural Mali which examined food security and necessary policy changes in the context of climate change. The analyses of interviews with 26 participants carried out 12 months after the workshop suggested positive changes in learning and networking, but only limited influence on systems understanding. There was limited change in practice, but the reported changes occurred at the individual level, and no policy outcomes were evident. However, by building the adaptive capacity of participants, the scenario process had laid the foundation for ongoing collective action, and potential institutional and policy transformation. We conclude that to enhance the resilience of agricultural and food systems under climate change, participatory scenario processes require a broader range of cross-scale actors' engagement to support transformational changes. Such process will both catalyse deeper learning and more effective link with national level policymaking process. In addition, individual scenario planning exercises are unlikely to generate sufficient learning and reflection, and instead they should form one component of more extensive and deliberate stakeholder engagement, learning and evaluation processes.
Regional Environmental Change, 2013
How effective are multi-stakeholder scenariosbuilding processes to bring diverse actors together and create a policy-making tool to support sustainable development and promote food security in the developing world under climate change? The effectiveness of a participatory scenario development process highlights the importance of ''boundary work'' that links actors and organizations involved in generating knowledge on the one hand, and practitioners and policymakers who take actions based on that knowledge on the other. This study reports on the application of criteria for effective boundary work to a multi-stakeholder scenarios process in East Africa that brought together a range of regional agriculture and food systems actors. This analysis has enabled us to evaluate the extent to which these scenarios were seen by the different actors as credible, legitimate and salient, and thus more likely to be useful. The analysis has shown gaps and opportunities for improvement on these criteria, such as the quantification of scenarios, attention to translating and communicating the results through various channels and new approaches to enable a more inclusive and diverse group of participants. We conclude that applying boundary work criteria to multi-stakeholder scenarios processes can do much to increase the likelihood of developing sustainable development and food security policies that are more appropriate.
Do participatory scenario exercises promote systems thinking and build consensus?
Elementa: Science of the Anthropocene, 2016
Participatory scenario processes are associated with positive social learning outcomes, including consensusbuilding and shifts toward more systemic thinking. However, these claims have not been assessed quantitatively in diverse cultural and socio-ecological settings. We convened three stakeholder workshops around the future of agricultural development and rural livelihoods in Burkina Faso, Nigeria, and Malawi, using a participatory scenario generation process to examine proposed research and action priorities under conditions of uncertainty. We administered pre-and post-workshop surveys, and used a paired t-test to assess how stakeholders' rankings of research priorities changed after participating in the scenario visioning exercise. Workshop participants also listed their own priorities for research and implementation on both the pre-and post-survey forms. We found indications that the workshops promoted consensus-building around the research priorities, including a reduction in standard deviation of priority rankings post-workshop compared to pre-workshop; and a higher incidence of identical volunteered responses. We did not find evidence to support shifts in thinking to more systemic views of agricultural development. However, participants viewed themselves as having learned throughout the process. We conclude that scenario visioning does have the potential to foster consensusbuilding (one element of social learning) among diverse stakeholder groups. We urge researchers to continue to monitor and measure systems thinking outcomes from scenario visioning so that these processes may be designed to be more effective. 'game-changing' events which could alter the future state of a system (Swart et al., 2004). Scenarios which are generated by stakeholders themselves rather than by scientists or quantitative models are uniquely wellsuited to participatory planning and group exploration of the future of a complex system (Kok et al., 2011). Recent scenario planning exercises around agriculture in Africa include planning and development strategies in Tanzania (Enfors et al., 2008); and the Climate Change, Adaptation and Food Security scenario planning activities conducted by the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) Future Scenarios research team in East and West Africa (Vervoort et al., 2014).
2017
Ultimately, we learnt that by building relationships, working collaboratively, and developing cross-sectoral understanding, we can devise and implement adaptation plans that can transform agriculture and improve regional food security. In West Africa, ASSAR works in the semi-arid and dry sub-humid parts of Ghana and Mali — areas that are increasingly exposed to climatic extremes of droughts, floods and heavy rainfall. These changing conditions impact different people in different ways. For all living here, figuring out how to adapt to these uncertain circumstances is a challenging task that requires input from many different groups. Transformative Scenario Planning in Mali
Scenario planning, as a tool for thinking about the future, can be useful to those thinking about more sustainable futures. It can be of particular use to scientists and policy makers charged with the expectation – realistic or not – that they will produce knowledge and policy directions for embarking on more sustainable pathways into the future. This article argues that the key lies in how scenarios are conducted. Participation in scenario exercises, especially by those who will have to walk these pathways, is a critical factor in their usefulness. A particular approach called Participatory Scenario Planning has increasing uptake as a result, especially in envisaging different future trajectories in social-ecological systems. The authors present a related but alternative strategic planning approach, Transformative Scenario Planning (TSP) which is distinguished by its emphasis on: the diversity of participants, informed imagination over normative views (i.e. what could happen over what should happen) and the conversations that follow immediately after creating the scenarios. The qualitative difference is that its not only about participation, but about the depth of common understanding (not necessarily agreement) and the depth of relationship (not always amicable) which can enable three things: the production of a co-owned set of scenarios; the use of these scenarios to generate strategic conversations about more sustainable pathways into the future; and the potential to collaborate, often across polarised beliefs and positions, towards enabling these strategies. The TSP approach comprises five steps and is described here through the example of the South African Food Futures scenario exercise in which scientists and policy makers, amongst others, participated in vigorous ways.
Stakeholder-designed scenarios for global food security assessments
Global Food Security, 2020
To guide policymaking, decision makers require a good understanding of the long-term drivers of food security and their interactions. Scenario analysis is widely considered as the appropriate tool to assess 'wicked problems', such as ensuring global food security, that are characterized by a high level of complexity and uncertainty. This paper describes the development process, storylines and drivers of four new global scenarios that are specifically designed to explore global food security up to the year 2050. To ensure the relevance, credibility and legitimacy of the scenarios, they have been developed using a participatory process, involving a diverse group of stakeholders. The scenarios consist of storylines and a scenario database that presents projections for key drivers, which can be used as an input into global simulation models.
Futures, 2011
This paper critically assesses a series of scenario planning exercises in the Washington Metropolitan region and the State of Maryland within a broad and evolving framework of participatory planning. Reality Check, as the exercises were called, were a daylong set of activities using tools that encouraged stakeholder participation to develop scenarios focused on long-term regional sustainability. The paper draws upon planning theory, participant reactions, media reports, post-exercise outcomes and author's experiences of shaping the process. It illustrates how the model was adapted to multiple scales and contexts, and variations in desired technical complexity. The paper concludes that such processes have an inherent value in capturing the issues of the future and in creating awareness and knowledge. It argues that certain considerations such as early strategic engagement of stakeholders, flexibility of technical tools and diversity among organizers, all played a role in enhancing the dialogue. Furthermore, it suggests that when timed with favorable external conditions and designed within suitable institutional frameworks, they have the potential to provide a foundation from which tangible regional benefits can be realized.