Reasons for Hope, Yes Hope, in 2025
By Suzette Brooks Masters
As a new year dawns, it’s hard not to feel anxiety about what’s coming next, especially when it comes to American democracy. At times like these, it’s hard not to feel powerless and untethered, to check out or hunker down, to turn inward. But it’s important to remember that all this flux and tumult can create important openings for transformation. How we act and what visions for the future we advance when those openings occur are critical.
My way of not giving in to despair and apathy amid all this uncertainty is to look for sources of hope, to find in uncertainty itself reasons for hope.
Happily, once you look for the places where hope and imagination live, you find it in ample supply. As part of the research I conducted for Democracy Funders Network’s Imagining Better Futures for American Democracy report, I talked to dozens of visionaries who were imagining and creating new and better ways of being with one another, with nature, with technology and with the planet. The final section of that paper, titled Inspiration, is my curated compilation of examples of what better futures could look like in real life and in the imagination. Whenever I feel the pull of pessimism, I turn back to those examples.
Paradoxically, the challenge for me now is keeping up with all the examples of good work charting the path to better futures, and figuring out how they can be connected for greater collective impact and systemic change. Since I began an intentional practice of recording bright spots more than two years ago, I’ve developed a strong network of thinkers, aggregators, innovators and creators that I didn’t even know existed when I started my research. Their ideas and energy are a bulwark against the corrosive, soul crushing, aperture-narrowing impact of the dystopian media and political environment we inhabit, and against anti-democratic and regressive policies being enacted in the real world.
So as we embark on this momentous year, here are some reasons for hope I’d like to share, some happening here in the US, some further afield. They are filled with examples of dynamic ways to practice democracy better and design systems and use resources for the common good.
Governance Innovations
Civic assemblies: These deliberative processes convene a representative sample of randomly selected people to solve problems together. While especially common in Europe, they are gaining some steam in the US.
Democracy Vouchers: This campaign finance innovation provides vouchers to residents to enable them to donate to political campaigns. This empowers local citizens to participate in elections and puts more pressure on candidates to campaign in the community, not simply cater to wealthy donors.
Futures Committees: To my knowledge, Fort Collins, Colorado is the first city council committee explicitly focused on the longer term future. It creates the space for discovering and experimenting with new ideas, like citizens assemblies. Please let me know if there are other examples of legislative bodies establishing futures committees.
Future Design: A simple practice that involves imaginary time travel and role play allows participants to develop empathy for future generations and to engage in bolder thinking about how to solve problems today. It was developed in Japan by Tatsuyoshi Saijo but is starting to gain currency in other parts of the world.
Intergenerational Fairness Frameworks allow leaders to better understand the consequences of their policy decisions on people living today and in the future so they are fair across generations, thus correcting to an extent the presentist bias in policy making. They create evaluation mechanisms to systematically assess public policies.
Participatory Budgeting is a democratic practice that allows community members to decide how portions of their budget are allocated and spent. As sums and influence over budgetary priorities increases, this can shift how tax dollars are spent over time to sync with the public will.
UN Summit of the Future is a seminal gathering that occurred in 2024 and led to the adoption of a Declaration on Future Generations and of a Pact for the Future. Like the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights, this bold new framework has the potential tol transform how nations think about their roles and obligations to future generations.
Wales’ Well-being of Future Generations Act of 2015 is the first legislation of its kind to require the government to focus on wellbeing and on the impact of its actions on future generations. It creates new institutional roles, the Future Generations Commissioner, to advocate on behalf of future generations.
Innovative organizations and networks
Dark Matter Labs: Recognising the complex, entangled reality of living systems, Dark Matter Labs is exploring alternative pathways for organising society and stewarding the shared planetary commons.
Democracy 2076: This organization is dedicated to working towards brighter futures for our democracy in 2076 by focusing on constitutional reform, popular culture and narrative, and political party realignment.
Future Caucus: This organization brings a growing number of young lawmakers together to work in a productive bipartisan way for the common good and model constructive, collaborative practice.
Futurific Studios supports the creation of protopian content to imagine better futures ahead. Futurific funded A Brief History of the Future, a PBS series conceived by Ari Wallach that highlights several promising innovations.
Governance Futures Network: This network of doers and visionaries is experimenting with governance systems able to address 21st century problems to deliver better outcomes for people and planet now and into the future.
Interdisciplinary Workshop on Reimagining Democracy (IWORD): This is a small, invitational workshop on the future of democracy. It’s now been held three times. Its goal is to gather a diverse set of thinkers, industry practitioners, activists, and creatives to discuss how democracy might be reimagined in the current century.
Needham Resilience Network: This is a local network that works intentionally to cultivate belonging in the community (using the principles discussed in the Belonging Barometer) and work across differences to build a stronger, more cohesive community.
Next Generation Foresight Practitioners Network: Next Generation Foresight Practitioners is a network of over 900 people from all over the world who are using futures and foresight to create positive impact and systemic transformation globally.
Our Children’s Trust: This innovative legal organization brings lawsuits on behalf of young people to ensure a sustainable planet for generations to come, enshrining new rights to a healthy natural environment.
School of International Futures uses structured thinking about the future to usher in global transformations in systems and policy that create an equitable and sustainable world for generations to come.
Wellbeing Economy Alliance is a global network seeking to design an economy that serves both people and planet. In such an economy, rules, norms and incentives deliver flourishing for all people in harmony with our natural environment.
If this list doesn’t lift your spirits, try subscribing to Futurepolis, Next City, Progress Network and Reasons to be Cheerful and lose yourself in rabbit holes of possibility.
Suzette Brooks Masters is Senior Fellow and Director of the Better Futures Project at Democracy Funders Network. A version of this article appeared in The Fulcrum on January 24, 2025.
