Imagining Anti-Racist Futures Together
Context
THL’s national anti-racism programme (2024–2026) supports Finnish organizations in strengthening anti-racist practices, embedding structural transformation, and building peer networks for BIPOC professionals.
As part of this work, THL ran a year-long Anti-Racism Accelerator engaging practitioners across sectors.
We were invited to design and facilitate the programme’s final session: a keynote lecture on futures thinking & imagination, followed by a hands-on transition design workshop.
The challenge
Organizations increasingly understand the need for equity, yet translating this awareness into systemic and sustained change is difficult. For the accelerator’s final session, THL wanted to:
Activate imagination as a driver for societal and organizational transformation
Create a shared vision of anti-racist futures
Support participants in turning insights into practical next steps
Strengthen collective agency at the end of an intense year-long journey
Our approach
Our team combined futures thinking, imagination practice, and transition design into an integrated learning experience.
1. Keynote: Imagination & Transformative Futures
Zeynep delivered an inspiring lecture on:
Why imagination is essential infrastructure for systemic change
How futures thinking expands our sense of possibility
The role of collective storytelling in reshaping norms and institutions
This set the conceptual foundation and energized participants before the workshop.
2. Imagining 2050
Participants envisioned what an anti-racist Finland in 2050 might look and feel like across workplaces, services, institutions, and everyday life.
3. Worldbuilding Through Fiction
Through guided storytelling, the group collectively shaped the values, relationships, and cultural qualities of their future Finland.
4. Transition Roadmapping
Using transition design methods, participants backcasted from the desired future to identify pathways, enabling conditions, and immediate next steps.
Outcomes
The session generated far more than a vision — it created momentum.
A shared, emotionally resonant picture of an anti-racist Finland in 2050
Strong positive feedback and appreciation for the structure, facilitation, and depth of the experience
A renewed sense of hope and collective agency among participants
Actionable roadmaps that participants can take back to their organizations
A deeper understanding of imagination as a legitimate tool for systemic change
Impact beyond the workshop:
THL’s leadership found the process so valuable that they chose to adopt our transition roadmapping method for their own board meeting later that season.
Reflections
Anti-racist transformation requires more than policies or training. It requires the ability to imagine otherwise, align around long-term visions, and take coordinated steps toward them.
Our futures-based approach helped participants reconnect with purpose, see their role within a wider transformation, and experience how imagination can rebuild collective courage.
Interested in equity work, building systemic capacity, or exploring futures-based imagination as a tool for transformation?
Contact person
Zeynep Falay von Flittner
zeynep@falayconsulting.com