Building Anticipatory Capacity with Strategic Foresight in Government

1. Overview

In previous country studies (OECD, 2021[1]; OECD, 2021[2]), the OECD has found that strategic foresight capabilities in governments are often confined to silos or pockets of excellence, rather than integrated into a broader governance system. The impact of strategic foresight on government action could be determined by the extent to which it leads to good decision making, however, an analytical framework to evaluate such impact is not fully developed (Ko and Yang, 2024[3]). Furthermore, some countries face limitations in communicating to senior leadership the insights and rigorous research produced in foresight processes, which results in the loss of their uses and benefits (OECD, 2022[4]).

This leaves a considerable “impact gap” (Kononenko, 2021[5]; OECD, 2022[4]) between the potential and the actual outcomes of applying strategic foresight, e.g. for improved law-making, preparing impact assessments of policy proposals, developing strategies and evidence-based policy options, building partnerships, and designing fiscal incentives (Anghel, 2024[6]). To address this gap, the OECD’s Observatory of Public Sector Innovation (OPSI) has been supporting governments to build futures and foresight knowledge into decision-making and core government processes, with the help of structured governance frameworks (Tõnurist and Hanson, 2020[7]; OECD, 2022[4]; OECD, 2023[8]; Monteiro and Dal Borgo, 2023[9]).

One recent initiative aimed at addressing these challenges is the project “Anticipatory Governance: Opportunities for public sector strategic foresight in Italy, Lithuania, and Malta”, funded by the European Union through the Technical Support Instrument (TSI) of the European Commission DG REFORM. Informally named LIMinal (from the initials of Lithuania, Italy, and Malta), the project ran from January 2023 to September 2024. The term LIMinal refers to the attributes of liminality (Turner, 1969[10]), an ambiguous state in which each country found itself at the project’s inception, i.e. neither at the forefront nor in the background of anticipatory capacity and foresight practice.

“Liminal entities are neither here nor there; they are betwixt and between the positions assigned and arrayed by law, custom, convention, and ceremonial.” – Victor Turner

The LIMinal project aimed to increase participating governments’ abilities and capacity to address emergent, interconnected challenges whose impacts are hard to anticipate. It was also intended to guide these governments towards becoming best-practice references in strategic foresight.

1.1. Initial context in each country

At the initiation of the project, anticipatory innovation governance capacity in the project countries was fragmented and under-developed, despite the pockets of excellence in each.

In Lithuania, several opportunities had emerged in recent years to strengthen anticipatory innovation governance and strategic foresight in the public administration. The creation of a Parliamentary Committee for the Future in 2020 and the development of a long-term strategy (Progress Strategy, Lithuania’s Vision for the Future, “Lithuania 2050”, hereinafter LT2050), which combined strategic foresight with strategic planning, were under way. However, strategic foresight was still a relatively novel practice in the Lithuanian public administration, and widespread competencies across government remained underdeveloped. The Government Strategic Analysis Centre (STRATA) served as the key counterpart organisation for the project. Additionally, the Strategic Management Law,1 approved in 2020 and supplemented at the end of 2021, introduced the principle that strategic management must be based on foresight. This mandates that planning documents systematically assess various future possibilities and their implications for Lithuania in the context of European and global developments.

In Italy, pockets of excellence and experimentation with strategic foresight existed. The public administration as a whole, however, did not take a systematic approach to incorporating strategic foresight into the design and introduction of long-term policies. The National School of Administration (Scuola Nazionale dell’Amministrazione, or SNA), a body under the Presidency of the Council of Ministers and the key counterpart organisation for the project, aimed to build capacity and make strategic foresight and anticipation a standard component of policymaking. This included plans to design a foresight ecosystem and set up a suitable organisational framework for anticipatory innovation governance.

In Malta, the National Post Pandemic Strategy of 2021 included the priority to “strengthen foresight and anticipatory governance capabilities across governance architecture”. While foresight practices did exist in certain areas of government, the public administration lacked a structured foresight capacity and a dedicated foresight training programme. In this context, increasing the government’s ability to anticipate and prepare for possible future disruptions and to integrate strategic foresight into public policy design and implementation became a pressing need. The Office of the Prime Minister, with the Institute for the Public Service, served as key counterpart organisations for the project.

In close collaboration with the organisations mentioned above and public officials in Lithuania, Italy, and Malta, the OECD assessed the current state of anticipatory innovation governance capacity and strategic foresight practice and identified potential areas for development in the public administrations and policymaking systems of each country. This involved substantive pilot interventions and capacity building. From interviews, surveys, focus groups, and dialogues with key stakeholders, complemented by desk research, several findings emerged.

To provide a solid foundation for research and close co-operation with the partner countries, the OECD applied the The Anticipatory Innovation Governance framework. This allowed the OECD to assess the current state of anticipatory governance and strategic foresight practice, to identify potential areas for development, and to select pilot and capacity-building measures (see Box ‎1.1 for the project timeline and Annex A for the activities conducted in each LIMinal country).

In addition, the LIMinal project placed a strong emphasis on communities of practice and capacity building as essential components in developing anticipatory governance. Ultimately, the collaboration and capacity of governments are critical to development, learning, and innovation. When government capacity hinders development, it can create what is known as a “capability trap”:

The conventional approach to state capacity downplays recurring implementation failures, considering them minor and easily solvable setbacks. However, (Andrews, Pritchett and Woolcock, 2017[11]) argue that a country’s level of development is determined by its capacity for implementation. Unsuccessful implementation in governance activities indicates a failure in the underlying theory of change. This, combined with contextual factors specific to each country, is what contributes to organisations and agents falling to inadequate levels of capacity, allowing the existence of capability traps. These traps occur when governments cannot effectively perform their tasks, and persisting with the same approaches often worsens the situation (Collao Jul, 2023[12]).

To tackle these objectives, the project formulated the following overarching research question:

• How can the capacity to implement strategic foresight and anticipatory innovation governance in government be strengthened?

This overarching research question is explored from various perspectives through additional targeted questions, each addressed in specific chapters of the report. These questions, outlined in Table ‎1.1, provide a structured approach to examining dimensions of building capacity in strategic foresight and anticipatory innovation in government.

Table ‎1.1. Related chapters and research questions addressed by project LIMinal activities

Chapters	Research questions	Project activities
Chapters 2 and 3	1. What is the current institutional framework of anticipatory governance, in terms of set-up, capabilities, and practices?	Assessment of the anticipatory governance landscape and capacity in government in each of the countries, researching the existing institutional set-up, futures literacy, and practices across government, while exploring levers for improvement. The purpose was to identify what prevents or inhibits progress towards meaningful and significant strengthening and integration of strategic foresight and anticipatory innovation, and to outline considerations for enhancing capacity and governance.
	2. What are the challenges to deploying and improving?
Chapter 4	3. What institutional considerations are necessary to strengthen strategic foresight mechanisms and overcome implementation challenges in each country?	Development of key considerations on the institutional set-up of strategic foresight mechanisms for each country, based on the findings in the assessment reports on building up and integrating strategic foresight and anticipation capacity, and also on discussions with stakeholders. The goal is to identify policy areas and strategic processes that have the greatest potential for intervention. This includes co-operation mechanisms, methodologies and tools, and dissemination and communication strategies that can generate broader, ongoing engagement.
Chapters 5 and 6	4. How can capacity building be employed to address challenges and skills needs?	Creation of five capacity-building programmes of study for strategic foresight and anticipation, with an accompanying guidebook and curriculum map. These include content broadly relevant to all three countries, and cognitive as well as technical skills and methods related to foresight, anticipation, and innovation. The capacity-building programmes aimed to address real anticipatory governance challenges, by creating logical links with the country assessments through specific considerations.
Chapter 7	5. How can communities of practice help provide experience, capability, and expertise to address challenges?	Creation of guidelines for developing and maintaining communities of practice for strategic foresight, both nationally and internationally. This includes designing proposals to develop institutions and networks of practice for strategic foresight and to facilitate international peer exchange. The goal was to introduce guidance providing inspiration, good examples, and best practices for communities of practice encouraging government foresight. This could offer a supporting context for strategic foresight.

Box ‎1.1. Project timeline

The LIMinal project started in January 2023 and ended in September 2024, and spanned several interconnected phases:

• Months 1 to 6 focused on scoping, establishing working contacts, and understanding the initial state of anticipatory capacity in each country, while initiating the work on guidelines of communities of practice, and starting broad capacity-building programmes in Lithuania.

• Months 6 to 12 focused on assessment (e.g. through desktop research and surveys) of anticipatory capacity and strategic foresight practices, as well as peer exchange. Additionally, research into strategic foresight curriculum began, and pilot case studies were initiated in Malta – with the Ministry for Social Policy and Children’s Rights (MSPC) and with the Ministry for Education, Sport, Youth, Research and Innovation (MEYR) – and in Lithuania with the Ministry of Transport and Communications.

• Months 12 to 18 focused on capacity building and finalising individual country action plans, as well as foresight curricula. Pilot case study and capacity building in Italy and Malta and report drafting were conducted.

Throughout the project, peer exchanges were initiated to support and enhance the activities above, with a physical study visit in April 2024 to Finland and a final retrospective workshop in October 2024, in co-ordination with the OECD Government Foresight Community.

1.2. The Anticipatory Innovation Governance framework

As outlined in the previous sections, the Anticipatory Innovation Governance (AIG) framework was applied in the LIMinal project to provide a foundation to research the current state of governance and offer suggestions for improvement.

The OECD’s AIG framework was developed to support anticipatory governance and integrate strategic foresight into policy processes. The AIG framework aims to help countries identify governance mechanisms that they can leverage or develop and capacity building they can undertake, to integrate strategic foresight into policy processes. The AIG framework has been applied in public sector contexts in numerous countries, including Finland (OECD, 2022[4]) and Latvia (OECD, 2023[8]).

AIG is a broad-based capacity to actively explore options as part of broader anticipatory governance, which is a proactive approach that integrates foresight, innovation, and experimentation into the core of policymaking (OECD, forthcoming[13]). It specifically aims to drive innovation (novel in the context, implemented, and resulting in a shift in public values) in the face of uncertainty (Tõnurist and Hanson, 2020[7]). The OECD proposed the AIG framework to reinforce governments’ capacity to tackle complex challenges (OECD, 2022[4]).

AIG operates in established government core architectures and acts on a variety of inputs to manage emerging challenges. It enables governments to use tools, methods, and information resources to anticipate and innovate in the face of fast-moving change and builds a public sector system that creates demand and validation for this work.

AIG is enabled by a set of mechanisms related to agency and the authorising environment, which help to overcome the “impact gap” (OECD, 2022[4]), where high-quality, policy-driven foresight is underused. This tends too often to result in a failure to achieve real results and policy change, due to barriers relating to agency or the authorising environment.

• Authorising environment is the system in the public sector that validates anticipatory innovations – providing feedback that there is demand, value, and use for the work. Typical barriers include: thematic silos, lack of support from senior decision makers, conflicts of interest, and public value.

• Agency defines the tools, methods, and information resources that enable public servants and organisations to anticipate and innovate in practice. Typical barriers include: cognitive biases, such as aversion to uncertainty, groupthink, status quo bias and loss aversion, and also conflicting incentives.

Figure ‎1.1. Mechanisms that influence authorising environment and agency

Table ‎1.2. Overview of the Anticipatory Innovation Governance mechanisms

Category	Mechanism	Example Indication
Authorising Environment	Vested Interest and Cognitive Biases	Assessing how the stakeholders participating in the policymaking process might be influenced by hidden assumptions or expectations, and taking steps to reduce bias.
	Public Interest and Participation	Proactively engaging the public to: provide input for the policy development process, consider future changes, and validate proposed actions. Digital platforms for public consultation and co-creation workshops could be used to solicit citizen feedback on the innovation process.
	Networks and Partnerships	Forming and effectively governing strategic partnerships with universities, as well as private sector and civil society organisations, to leverage their expertise and resources.
	Legitimacy	Ensuring legitimacy in the policy process through public participation and reporting, and obtaining formal approval from regulatory bodies or legislative councils.
	Evidence and Evaluation	Informing policy development through robust and appropriate evidence, and using pilot projects and continuous evaluation as a way of gathering evidence on the efficacy of new approaches.
	Learning Loops	Establishing mechanisms for regular review and adaptation of policies, based on feedback.
Agency	Alternatives Exploration and Experimentation	Developing and testing a range of possible solutions to allow for the combination of different approaches and refinement of ideas. An example is using sandboxes (safe-to-fail experimentation spaces) to test new policies in controlled environments.
	Tools and Methods	Having the capacity to assess and apply a range of strategic foresight methods so that they can be used appropriately, whether for analytical, strategic, consultative, prescriptive, or creative purposes.
	Data and Measurement	Developing systems to pick up weak signals of change and process data, including the use of “big” or novel data sources and the collection of “thick” qualitative data, such as through crowdsourcing.
	Organisational Capacity	Structuring organisations’ processes and teams and supplying them enough resources to explore innovative and potentially disruptive approaches to reform existing practices, for example through dedicated innovation teams.
	Sense-Making	Organising regular strategic foresight exercises to interpret global trends and their implications for national policy or creating cross-sectoral forums to discuss and make sense of complex issues.
	Institutional Structures	Understanding the institutional structure of the governance system (e.g. polycentric, centralised) in order to select appropriate and effective approaches to integrate strategic foresight.

Source: Adapted from Tõnurist and Hanson (2020[7]).

AIG mechanisms must be flexible and dynamic: there is no one-size fits all governance model or best practice to deal with the future. New combinations of governance mechanisms can make room for anticipatory innovation in the government’s innovation portfolios and core architecture. Such governance mechanisms might be compared to a web that shapes decisions at every level over time.

1.2.1. Strategic foresight

Strategic foresight is an established practice of an organisation to constantly perceive, make sense of, and act upon different ideas of the future emerging in the present (OECD-OPSI, 2021[14]). It is a structured and explicit exploration of multiple futures in order to inform decision making. It is recognised as both a distinct set of methods and an organisational practice. In this report, strategic foresight is considered a foundational, knowledge-producing element of anticipatory governance. However, the outputs of strategic foresight methods are often not acted upon consistently or systematically, to achieve innovation. This can be attributed to various factors, some involving organisational barriers and culture, and also because they are not sufficiently integrated into governance structures and functions, a primary focus of this report.

Strategic foresight must be built into a broader framework that includes an enabling authorising environment and the necessary capabilities to legitimise and sustain its implementation. It should also aim to operationalise the knowledge generated (Tõnurist and Hanson, 2020[7]) and complement existing governance activities that may not explicitly fall under foresight practices.

The practice of strategic foresight enables organisations to inform present actions by gathering and analysing information about the future operating environment of organisations and institutions, creatively examining the current landscape for meaningful trends and using such insights to extrapolate or explore potential outcomes that can benefit decision making or strategy development (OECD, 2017[15]).

Globally, governments are increasingly adopting strategic foresight methods to identify weak signals and emerging trends, enabling early warnings of potential disruptions. It helps governments identify opportunities, challenges and risks while enhancing the resilience and effectiveness of policies and long-term strategies, as well as building common ground among stakeholders. In an era marked by rapid change, unpredictability, novelty, and ambiguity, the limitations of traditional forecast-based planning become more pronounced. Such approaches often rely on linear projections and extrapolation of a “past and present empirical reality”, assuming a stable and predictable environment (Gümüsay and Reinecke, 2024[16]). However, they can fall short in addressing global emergencies and transformative shifts such as the climate crisis or the rapid advancements in machine-learning technologies, where the future is likely to diverge significantly from the past (Gümüsay and Reinecke, 2024[16]). Strategic foresight serves as a complementary practice to address these limitations. By challenging existing assumptions about the future, it equips governments to prepare for a wider range of possibilities and navigate complex, uncertain environments more effectively.

1.3. Strategic Foresight Toolkit for Resilient Public Policy

The LIMinal project has piloted the OECD Strategic Foresight Toolkit for Resilient Public Policy: A Comprehensive Foresight Methodology to Support Sustainable and Future-Ready Public Policy (hereafter, the Toolkit) to prepare a series of strategic foresight workshops, including a future-proofing stress-test exercise, for Lithuania (see Section 4 in Chapter 5). Focusing on broad and overarching strategic topics relevant for public administrations in Lithuania, it was designed to help Lithuania to consider relevant future disruptions and their potential policy implications (OECD, 2025[17]).

Strategic foresight is a methodology for anticipating, exploring, and shaping the future in a structured and systematic way. It is vital for effective decision making on complex issues in a world that is always evolving. The Toolkit is designed to help policy makers evaluate the future-readiness of long-term strategies and policies. It was initially conceived as a tool to help governments and organisations develop and/or stress-test their long-term climate strategies, but as the research process advanced – including by piloting it to Lithuania through the LIMinal project – it has been expanded to consider a range of policy areas outside the environmental sphere. Recognising that long-term policy objectives require horizontal rather than siloed policymaking, the OECD identified several factors – environmental, technological, economic, social and governance – that could, if they materialised, significantly alter the policy landscape in the coming decades. After extensive research, this report proposes 25 such factors (termed “disruptions”).

A tailored process was developed to assist governments and organisations in exploring each of these disruptions, first individually and then in various combinations, to help design and assess policies and strategies against a range of possible futures as part of a structured foresight methodology. This Toolkit guides policymakers through the foresight process and provides briefings on the 25 disruptions, giving them all the tools to evaluate the robustness of current policies and strategies to future changes.

Figure ‎1.2. Disruptions that could change the policy landscape in 2030-50

Source: OECD (2025[17]), Strategic Foresight Toolkit for Resilient Public Policy: A Comprehensive Foresight Methodology to Support Sustainable and Future-Ready Public Policy, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/bcdd9304-en.

The Toolkit methodology guides participants through a five-module foresight process to stress-test public policy: 1) identify their core assumptions about the future, and how they might be challenged by future disruptions; 2) explore the consequences of multiple different disruptions occurring simultaneously; 3) create reference scenarios; 4) use scenarios to stress-test long-term strategies and policies, and finally; 5) to develop future-ready action steps for today to increase long-term resilience and the chances of successfully meeting policy objectives (see Figure ‎1.3) (OECD, 2023[18]; OECD, 2025[17]). The exercise helps participants to build foresight capacity as well as familiarity with key disruptions that may influence the policy landscape in coming years.

Figure ‎1.3. Five-module foresight process to stress-test public policy

Source: OECD (2025[17]), Strategic Foresight Toolkit for Resilient Public Policy: A Comprehensive Foresight Methodology to Support Sustainable and Future-Ready Public Policy, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/bcdd9304-en.

References

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[6] Anghel, S. (2024), “The use of strategic foresight in Commission impact assessments: Existing practices and the way forward”, Briefing, No. PE 757.801, European Parliamentary Research Service, https://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/BRIE/2024/757801/EPRS_BRI(2024)757801_EN.pdf.

[12] Collao Jul, J. (2023), State Capacity and Anticipation: How does an ineffective level of state capacity hinder anticipatory practices in government, and what measures can be taken? A country-case of Chile, LSE School of Public Policy, London.

[16] Gümüsay, A. and J. Reinecke (2024), “Imagining Desirable Futures: A call for prospective theorizing with speculative rigour”, Organization Theory, Vol. 5/1, https://doi.org/10.1177/26317877241235939.

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[9] Monteiro, B. and R. Dal Borgo (2023), “Supporting decision making with strategic foresight: An emerging framework for proactive and prospective governments.”, OECD Working Papers on Public Governance, No. 63, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/1d78c791-en.

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[1] OECD (2021), Mobilising Evidence at the Centre of Government in Lithuania: Strengthening Decision Making and Policy Evaluation for Long-term Development, OECD Public Governance Reviews, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/323e3500-en.

[15] OECD (2017), Developing an integrated policy approach to risk management, GOV/PGC/HLRF/RD(2017)1, unpublished.

[13] OECD (forthcoming), Towards Anticipatory Governance Guidelines for Public Sector Organisations, OECD Publishing, Paris.

[14] OECD-OPSI (2021), “Towards a strategic foresight system in Ireland”, OECD Policy Brief, https://oecd-opsi.org/publications/foresight-ireland/.

[7] Tõnurist, P. and A. Hanson (2020), “Anticipatory innovation governance: Shaping the future through proactive policy making”, OECD Working Papers on Public Governance, No. 44, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/cce14d80-en.

[10] Turner, V. (1969), “Liminality and Communitas”, in The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure, pp. 94-130, Aldine Publishing, Chicago.

Note

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