Foresight Scenarios on Populism: Imagining Central and Eastern European Politics in 2030

This paper will present a set of foresight scenarios being developed within an EU H2020 research project on the evolution of populism in Central and Eastern Europe (POPREBEL). The scenarios will be put together using conventional foresight techniques (horizon scanning, drivers, etc.) and emerge as a set of narrative tales (both positive and negative) about what political development and populism might look like in CEE in 2030. While often used as tools for future-thinking in the business world, scenarios have found less use in the academic realm. At the same time, they may be very useful in order to contemplate different trajectories for future scholarly research. Therefore, the paper will encompass a clearly interactive dimension, in which not only the discussant, but also audience members will be invited to imagine these futures and to react to what might need to be reckoned with depending on the given outcome. Scenarios are in this respect not predictions, but discursive instruments for analyzing the direction of certain trends. The question of where populism and political development is going in Central and Eastern Europe is crucial not only because of the current cases of backsliding in the region (Hungary, Poland), but also other countries that seem to be following suit (Romania, Serbia, Czech Republic). Through its use of scenarios, this paper will provide an important new perspective to how we can understand – and envision – the evolution of political radicalism in the contemporary era. The author has conducted foresight exercises before, most prominently as part of a Forward Look publication for the European Science Foundation (“Central and Eastern Europe Beyond Transition: Convergence and Divergence in Europe”, 2012). The given foresight research constitutes an entire work package with the POPREBEL project and is being led by the author.