ABSTRACT
Futuring and experimentation are two approaches for thinking about urban futures. Futurists are impatient with the present and derive recommendations for present action from the construction of desired futures. Experimenters are frustrated with talk-no-action about futures, thus their focus on opportunities in the present. Contrasting city futures in the global North and South, a synthesis is developed that validates the evolutionary potential of the present. The result is a theory of radical incrementalism. However, following the work of Roberto Unger, the transformative power of radical incrementalism is underrated because of “structure fetishism” – the tendency to think that the only significant change is structural change.
