Scenarios and ethnography: Infrastructural futures as windows into the present

Peter Schweitzer; Olga Povoroznyuk; Philipp Budka; Alexandra Meyer; Katrin Schmid; Nikita Strelkovskii

doi:10.1177/08912416251398488

Scenarios and ethnography: Infrastructural futures as windows into the present

Peter Schweitzer (Korresp. Autor*in)
, Olga Povoroznyuk
, Philipp Budka
, Alexandra Meyer
, Katrin Schmid
, Nikita Strelkovskii

Institut für Kultur- und Sozialanthropologie

Veröffentlichungen: Beitrag in Fachzeitschrift › Artikel › Peer Reviewed

Abstract

Large-scale infrastructures are typically part of development projects that are global in ambition and local in their impacts. While anthropology has a decent track record of using ethnographic methods in the study of infrastructure, it typically lacks the capacity to provoke statements or attitudes regarding larger development plans. Scenario workshops, initially developed by researchers in the field of foresight studies, turn out to be productive tools in eliciting assessments of the present by talking about possible futures. The European Research Council project InfraNorth conducted scenario workshops in two locations in Canada and Norway in 2023, in which four scenarios were presented and discussed. Apart from speculations about what the future might bring, these discussions provided ethnographic insights that went beyond what we had found before through more traditional means of ethnography. We suggest that scenarios and scenario workshops have the potential to offer ethnographic windows into infrastructural presents by talking about the future.

Originalsprache	Englisch
Seiten (von - bis)	14-36
Seitenumfang	23
Fachzeitschrift	Journal of Contemporary Ethnography
Jahrgang	55
Ausgabenummer	1
Frühes Online-Datum	Feb. 2025
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1177/08912416251398488
Publikationsstatus	Veröffentlicht - Feb. 2026

Fördermittel

The authors disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: primary funding for the research was provided by a grant from the European Research Council (Project “Building Arctic Futures: Transport Infrastructures and Sustainable Northern Communities (InfraNorth),” project ID: 885646). Additional funding during the write-up phase came from the Belmont Forum, the Austrian Research Promotion Agency FFG and the Austrian Ministry of Education and Research BMBW (Project “ARCA,” project ID: 999909343/52036292), as well as from EU Horizon Europe (Project “ILLUQ,” project ID: 101133587). We would like to express our sincere gratitude to workshop participants, as well as other interlocutors and research partners, for their interest, engagement, and support. We are thankful to two anonymous reviewers and the editors of this journal for enabling a special issue addressing how infrastructure can be captured ethnographically. The authors disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: primary funding for the research was provided by a grant from the European Research Council (Project “Building Arctic Futures: Transport Infrastructures and Sustainable Northern Communities (InfraNorth),” project ID: 885646). Additional funding during the write-up phase came from the Belmont Forum, the Austrian Research Promotion Agency FFG and the Austrian Ministry of Education and Research BMBW (Project “ARCA,” project ID: 999909343/52036292), as well as from EU Horizon Europe (Project “ILLUQ,” project ID: 101133587).

ÖFOS 2012

504008 Ethnographie
504034 Sozialanthropologie
504017 Kulturanthropologie
509019 Zukunftsforschung

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10.1177/08912416251398488

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Scenarios and ethnography: Infrastructural futures as windows into the present

Abstract

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ÖFOS 2012

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