Abstract
The paper examines the role of literary, artistic and media utopias within societal discourses concerning the
development of technology. It here specifically addresses the interaction between the performance of these
three components of societal discourses with the elaboration of scientific approaches towards the future.
Focusing on the genre of science fiction it shows that the design of negative (dystopian) and positive
(eutopian) scenarios in all its works (novels, art, movies) not only represent a valid examination of futures but have a significant impact on their shaping as well. Taking up movements and moods within society, they
represent ‘soft’ factors that – in their function as driving forces – are as effective and consequential as ‘hard’
factors. Thus, studying ‘soft’ factors offers complementary insights an analysis of the ‘hard’ rational-scientific, political and economic factors and their consequences for the future cannot provide. Literary, artistic and media utopias enter moreover into a complex interaction with science in general and futures research in particular (and equally well with technology assessment, science and technology studies and similar interdisciplinary future-oriented academic endeavours). Against this background it becomes evident that literary approaches to the future unleash important (indirect, mediating) impacts on the processes shaping technical developments. Furthermore, they seem to exert a decisive influence on the social acceptance of farreaching technical developments (like genetic engineering or artificial intelligence) and on the framing of schemes for public funding of science (like the Horizon 2020 program of the European Union). These very factors, acceptance and framing, are of utmost importance for aligning and shaping the actual pathways of innovation. Against this background we can draw conclusions about the stimulant power of imaginative futures and their capacity to alter realities.