Eleonora Masini: Nurturing visions of the future

Abstract

This profile is an overview of the remarkable career of Eleonora Barbieri Masini, the mother of Futures Studies, who dedicated her professional life to nurturing hopeful visions of the future. She was a leading proponent for studying the future and a reviewer of the field. An Italian sociologist, Masini was first influenced by French thinkers, then by the advocacy of Aurelio Peccei, co-founder of the Club of Rome, with whom she became a close friend. During the change swirling around her beloved Europe, as it struggled for post-war reconstruction, she helped establish the World Futures Studies Federation, taking this global network of futurists behind the Iron Curtain and into the developing world. She was always on the move, particularly seeking out and encouraging women to take seriously their special role in both envisioning and creating the future. Her own hope for the future, which she held against the tide, helped lift her beyond a bleak present.