Count Me In: Money & Movements April 2018, Naivasha, Kenya

How to explore, innovate and respond more pro-actively to emerging trends? How do you plan for the future?

Spring was invited to the Money & Movements conference, organized by Count Me In!: a consortium led by Mama Cash, and included the sex worker-led Red Umbrella Fund, the Association for Women’s Rights in Development (AWID), CREA, Just Associates and Urgent Action Fund – Africa.

The power of Future Framing is the loosening of present boundaries and allowing the mind to travel forward. Through this creative process, participants come away with new insights about trends, their possible outcomes, and a deeper, clearer view of risks as well as opportunities. The purpose of Future Framing is to identify strategies and responses that strengthen the capacity of organizations and networks in pro-actively shaping the future.

Money & Movements brought together 100+ activists and feminist funders to strategize about the future of feminist organizing and funding of this work.

Participants came from around the world and across movements – women’s rights, sex workers’ rights, LBQTI rights, youth, Indigenous rights, environmental and economic justice, disability rights, health, and more.

Together, they asked:

  • What is the change we want to see... bold and fully-resourced?
  • What do our movements need to be resilient?
  • What would a transformative and feminist funding ecosystem look like?
  • What is the future of funding?

To help answer these questions, the Spring team was asked to create and present future scenarios. By experiencing the future through the power of visualization, music and acting, participants experienced three different scenarios where very different things are at stake.

After experiencing each story participants were asked to reflect on the following questions: What inspires about this future scenarios? What has been lost? What questions does it raise for feminist organizing today? And what questions does it raise for resourcing feminist organizing? And finally, what competencies need to be developed in order to pro-actively engage with these trends, and be future ready?

Fast forward to the year 2035 where nothing looks the same…:

Jump to

Scenario 1: Pop-up Feminism: ‘And the Award Goes To…’

Scenario 2: Climate Warriors: Surviving Climate Catastrophe

Scenario 3: ANNARES acupuncture revolution: Better Artificial Intelligence

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Scenario 1: Pop-up Feminism: ‘And the Award Goes To…’

Imagine a world where the feminist struggle – once the domain of groups of avant-garde independent feminist activists – has become well and truly pop! Musicians, actors, corporate leaders, social media influencers, men, women, transgender and intersex people – everyone \ has jumped in the pool and is swimming in feminist glitter! 

The balance of power in the world has shifted to the Global South and East, and has become more and more local. Mobile transfers, crowdsourcing and shopping-for-justice are powerful methods to get money to where it’s truly needed. People are organizing where they are, raising funds amongst themselves, making and selling their own products, and connecting to a vibrant celebrity activist scene. 

Campaigns to achieve feminism and gender equality are celebrated around the world. Brave local activism is more revered than any achievement in art or business.

Though the medium of an international awards show called the WE FOR WE AWARDS, – the world’s new ‘Academy Awards’! – participants experienced what excellence and best achievement in local activisms might look like in the future, by all genders and towards equality for all. What will it look like, when feminism becomes increasingly popular? What is the potential of this for real transformation? And what has been lost? And also, how to engage with elements of this trend that we are seeing today?

Scenario 2: Climate Warriors – Surviving Climate Catastrophe

The world has been through painful and dramatic change. In the decade following 2018, the planet descended into climate catastrophe. Stable climates became a thing of the past. Governments spent huge amounts of money maintaining city infrastructures under siege by floods, fires and hurricanes. After years of trade wars, global co-operation and official Development Aid ceased to exist. The United Nations collapsed. All money was allocated domestically, to climate crisis-related humanitarian needs, and to security and surveillance. Right wing populist governments took over the world. Most societies became closed and insular. Governments spent tax monies to control and monitor the activities of their citizens. NGOs became a thing of the past. 

But eventually things began to change. Former NGO leaders stopped fighting each other for money and recognition and started working together in a common and global ‘Climate Warrior’ movement. This multi-actor movement, which started in the Pacific, succeeded in aligning business to contribute 10% of profits to this movement.

Two Climate Warrior leaders, an Indigenous Rights leader and a corporate leader, narrated the history and milestones of the Climate Warriors movement through a dialogue. This included how the world went from climate calamity and collapse of the old order, to a new, much more hopeful world that brings people back together, across civil society, corporate sector and governments. How key will climate crisis be to the well-being and rights of human beings? What are key turning points that reversed the disaster?

Scenario 3: ANNARES Acupuncture Revolution: Better Artificial Intelligence

In 2019, Artificial Intelligence began to take over decision-making in many aspects of daily life. It started with medical use, job search and voice recognition but soon took over banking, voting and policing, and medicine.

Feminists began to understand what this consolidation of power could mean: the potential of reversing years of social justice progress. Activists urgently needed to get into the AI system. They had to infiltrate the institutions being overtaken by AI, including finance, where new cryptocurrency technologies made it possible for the wealthy, terrorists and criminal cartels to hide and move money. A new anarchist group is created, called ANNARES, and a manifesto developed. ANNARES successfully infiltrates AI and redirects its focus to advancing feminist principles and futures.

Through the medium of the Feminist ANNARES holowaves, a virtual projection, participants experienced being part of the ANNARES resistance and underground movement. This scenario encouraged participants to explore the impact of technological disruption, and AI in particular. How will it inhibit and enable more just societies? And how about the role of highly centralized, high tech surveillance?  And also, how are we currently engaging with these trends, already underway?