Evaluation of technology foresight projects

Abstract

Foresight is a well-known and widely used methodology for the creation of medium and long-term visions of technological, economic and social development. The need for evaluating foresight projects is unquestionable, but it is still a scarce phenomenon. The interests of the authors of the paper are focused mainly on foresight impact as one of the principal aspects of foresight evaluation, although they are aware of numerous objectives and aspects of foresight evaluation. The authors show the outcomes of case study analyses of selected evaluations conducted with regard to national and transnational foresight projects. Furthermore, current attempts to create systemic foresight evaluation frameworks are presented. They comprise general evaluation frameworks meant for the evaluation of different aspects of foresight projects execution, with respect to the process and results, including foresight impact as one of evaluated aspects as well as frameworks devoted strictly to the foresight impact evaluation. Scientific work on foresight evaluation models is still in progress and the authors of the paper indicate the current stage of models’ development.