Foresight is the method of anticipating future developments and potential risks to inform strategic planning. In the EU, foresight has been integrated into policymaking since 2021 to create evidence-based strategies that anticipate future trends, risks and opportunities.
The EU is mandated to incorporate a gender perspective into all policies and activities to achieve gender equality, and foresight is no exception. By adopting a gender-transformative approach, foresight can better address the diverse needs and priorities of women and men, thus promoting gender equality by considering all subgroups as agents of change.
An intersectional perspective considers how gender and characteristics such as age, socioeconomic situation, disability, race, ethnicity, religion, gender identity, sexual orientation, rural or urban location are interconnected and influence people’s experiences.
There are numerous opportunities to incorporate a gender and intersecting inequalities perspective into foresight at different stages of the EU policy cycle and the ‘Better regulation’ framework. This policy brief explains how this can be achieved.