Fundamental Rights in an Uncertain Future: Strategic foresight for Europe 2040
This report explores how future changes could affect fundamental rights. It sets out ways to protect rights in the face of major transitions and helps institutions prepare before decisions become urgent. It is accompanied by practical guidance, ‘Embedding fundamental rights in foresight: A guide for practitioners’, designed to support practitioners integrate fundamental rights in foresight exercises.
TABLE OF CONTENT
Search inside this publication
Rapid and far-reaching change is already testing Europe’s ability to uphold fundamental rights in practice. As Europe confronts climate change, technological innovation, economic pressures and geopolitical uncertainty, the central question is not only how societies can become more resilient but also how fundamental rights can remain protected under changing conditions. This report explores what adaptations may be needed to keep legal safeguards enforceable over time and how fundamental rights can help shape public choices under uncertainty.
This report examines how long-term developments may affect the exercise, protection and enforcement of rights and what this could mean for legal safeguards, public accountability and institutional preparedness. Integrating fundamental rights into strategic foresight means considering from the outset who may be affected by future developments, which rights and safeguards may come under pressure and how choices made today could affect the protection of rights over time.
To explore these questions, the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) examined how fundamental rights can be embedded into strategic foresight. Strategic foresight explores how different futures may unfold and what they could mean for decisions taken today. The insights presented in this report can help policymakers, human rights organisations and foresight practitioners identify emerging challenges to fundamental rights, consider whether existing safeguards remain effective in different future scenarios and make more informed choices about how to protect rights and prepare for change.
A consortium led by the Austrian Institute of Technology implemented this foresight process in cooperation with FRA. FRA also consulted an informal advisory group, which included Eschel Alpermann (European Parliamentary Research Service, Policy Foresight Unit), Salvatore Finamore (General Secretariat of the Council of the European Union, Analysis and Research Team), Antonia Mochan and Petra Goran (both European Commission, Joint Research Centre, EU Policy Lab), Aaron Maniam (Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford) and Lauri Sivonen (independent expert). Finally, Dr Jaakko Kuosmanen (Finnish Academy of Science and Letters) provided expert peer review. While this report is solely the work of FRA, the Agency thanks these experts for their insights and critical review.
