CARIBBEANVISIONS 2020:

A PARTICIPATORY BRAINTRUST 

SATURDAY, APRIL 28, 2007

WASHINGTON DC 

JUSTIFICATION

Imagine the Caribbean.  Take 1:

It  is 2020.  The US War on terrorism has had one surprising impact. Increased the vulnerability of border states to attack.   One American Embassy in the Caribbean was bombed.   A second attempt was foiled when the plot was revealed by local drug trafficking kingpins who did not want to be a part of what they termed “mashing up dem country”.   As a result “sun and sand” vacation tourists have stopped coming, but the hotel infrastructure that was built in the 2010s remain in high demand as Caribbean doctor-investors convert them into swanky medical spas that make getting surgery a real vacation.  Rewind. Roll Tape 2.  

Imagine the Caribbean. Take 2:

It is 2020.  The War on terrorism has met with success owing to the intervention of Caribbean states as brokers in the Middle East peace process.  This surprising turn of events happened when Caribbean nationals of Arab and Jewish background decided to host in the Caribbean a Summit on Middle Eastern peace in 2010.  The visitors were taken to three different islands to revisit the legacy of Arab-Jewish cooperation in the Caribbean since the turn of the 20^th century.  The CARIBBEAN ACCORDS set down in 2020 and guided by the Caribbean people-diplomats led to the implementation of successful peace process. Stop Tape.   

Imagine the Caribbean in 2020.   What if we could time travel?  What if we could see what life will be like in 2020?   As we all know, predicting the future is impossible.  However, the power of strategic foresight has been used to engage individuals in group processes aimed at assisting communities in arriving at visions of their preferred future.  

Engaging the power of foresight through search conferences and other participatory processes offers groups and communities a way to assist us in better defining a shared vision; an action agenda and the outcome and impact of our actions.   

      As Caribbean Americans, many of us are engaged in individual or group efforts to  provide our home countries with the intellectual and financial capital support  needed to create desirable changes that will in turn result in some desired  development.  This is not easy.   We live in a period of rapid change. Technology  experts state that the rate of change itself is speeding up.  In fact some of the  technologies that will emerge in the next fifteen years have not even been  conceptualized.  The adage goes, “The faster the car, the stronger its headlights  must be.” In other words, the more rapid the rate of change, the longer view we  must take.  Planning for the future implies that we ask the questions, What could  happen? What can be done?  What will we do? How will we do it?  Therein lies the  power of foresight.  To engage our thinking around the  question “What could  happen”, we must engage in conscious thinking about the future.   

CaribbeanVisions 2020 is a participatory group process which will engage the power of foresight in addressing three key issues:

1. What are the driving forces that will promote or challenge the development prospects for the Caribbean in 2020?
2. What might be the role of the Caribbean American Diaspora in assisting the Caribbean region in optimizing development prospects for 2020?
3. How might the Caribbean American Diaspora be organized to best unleash their potential in service of the development prospects they foresee?

Using the processes of “futurecasting” to think about social, economic, environmental and political development issues of the Caribbean would be a vital step in unlocking both the knowledge and wisdom of the participants in Caribbean Visions 2020.  Moreover, this process will help us to better define our collective strengths and how we may collaborate effectively.    

      Our task as an “alliance of the willing” in participating in Caribbean Visions 2020, is  to provide the CARICOM Heads of Government with a starting point for locating the  idealism and vision of the Diaspora for the region as a whole.  Using the power of  foresight and appreciative enquiry to better define both the problem and solution  space, we will develop a series of plausible futures and action options for the  Caribbean Diaspora.  The Report of the process will be delivered at the CARICOM  Diaspora Forum on June 19-20.  It is said that, “the future belongs to those who  work to enliven their dreams.”   On April 28th, ‘we the people’, commit to  enlivening our dreams of a stable and prosperous Caribbean.