Abstract

This chapter introduces a new concept, the anticipatory present moment which offers a way of integrating Rosen’s seminal model of the anticipatory system with post-Rosen developments in second-order cybernetics and the ontology of the present moment. The APM is a meta-model that enables systems thinking and futures thinking to be accommodated in a paradigm that transcends the contradiction between the science of systems based on evidence from the past with futures scenarios which derive from the psychology and mental models of practitioners trying to anticipate the future. As well as anticipatory systems theory, the APM arises from a transdisciplinary study including the phenomenology of time consciousness, boundary critique, scenario method, reperception as induction, and multidimensionality of time. The APM provides a conceptual framework which is stimulating fresh ideas about practices which support strategic decision-making.