Extract

What is foresight, what is dialogue, and how can dialogue – especially the dialogue of cultures and civilizations – be used as a tool of foresight: globally, within regional entities, such as the European Union (EU), and within countries, all having diverse cultural populations which need to participate and interact with each other within their respective communities, if greater dialogue and understanding and common purpose are to be found? This chapter will briefly introduce and define foresight, including its role in the European Union, as well as dialogue, and then look in more depth at the principles of intercultural communication and dialogue for dealing with cultural diversity. It will then discuss the dialogue of civilizations (or groupings of cultures with similar characteristics) as an alternative to the ‘clash of civilizations’, as expounded by Samuel P. Huntington.