Futures of Well-Being – Speculative Visions and Critical Perspectives [BIP]

Course description

How can we conceptualize “well-being” as a social, political, and cultural vision? What is a “good life”? How do competing understandings of “well-being” and “the good life” imagine the flourishing of everyone versus the flourishing of some? How do different knowledge and value systems shape these competing visions for a “good life” and a “better future”? And how do these possible futures of well-being relate to the SDGs’ objective of producing a more peaceful, equitable, just, and sustainable societies as the SDGs envision them? 

Utopian and dystopian visions of what makes a good or bad life have existed for thousands of years. With this summer school, we invite students (MA/PhD) and scholars to discuss in an interdisciplinary and international setting which conceptualizations of well-being may be said to best serve individual and collective interests.

The summer school foregrounds interdisciplinary future thinking and critical speculation by bringing together different theoretical and practical perspectives on the topic of well-being. Organized around several SDGs, the different sessions of the summer school investigate competing visions for our shared future from the perspective of philosophy, history, political science, teacher education, and literary studies. Zooming in on different cultural contexts, historical periods, and geographical locations, they foreground questions of history, the human, social and economic justice, sustainability, techno-scientific development, and knowledge production, while critically examining utopian and dystopian discourses surrounding ideas of a better future, the good life, and collective well-being.

Combining instructor-led discussion sessions together on their own research projects, the summer school aims to facilitate students’ engagement with concepts, theories, cultural materials, and methodological tools that encourage critical as well as creative thinking about the future and well-being. By alternating periods of reflection and practical exercises, plenary discussions and group work, academic and social programming, participants will be invited to compare different conceptualizations of well-being and the good life, and to analyze how all future visions and practices of speculation, including those undertaken by scientists and scholars, are shaped by specific knowledge systems, value frameworks, and disciplinary perspectives.

This summer school is designed to support participants in assessing the social, political, cultural, ethical, and ecological implications of different futures of well-being, and in connecting speculative imaginaries of the future with contemporary policy frameworks such as the SDGs. Particular emphasis will be placed on enabling participants to identify and reflect on the frequently implicit assumptions about well-being, futurity, and the good life that inform their own scholarly work, research methods, and theoretical commitments, and how these impact society.