Each phase of accelerated growth within a society also brings with it desires for deceleration. In view of technology-driven social transformations such as digitalisation, datafication or platformisation, critical perspectives on the role of technologies in society have been gaining traction, with the desire for a more just, humane and less technology-centred degrowth society becoming more widespread (e.g. Guenot & Vetter, 2019). These perspectives interweave critique of contemporary, technology-driven social transformation, with an interest in futures and futurity (e.g. Appadurai, 2021). Against the backdrop of the Covid-19 pandemic, austerity, right-wing populism and technological acceleration, there is increased uncertainty today about many things in everyday life that could previously be taken for granted. Against this backdrop, this paper addresses how grassroots educational practitioners’ hopes for the future articulate a critique of the present and construe (im)possible futures.

The paper is contextualised in recent work on futures-making (e.g. Knox et al., 2020; Selwyn, 2021; Swist & Gulson, 2023). This research, sometimes based in empirical research, other times as social science fiction, critically reflects on the impact of technological change on society, creating versions of utopias and dystopias. Informed by the notion that a “historical retrospective” is necessary for the formulation of futures (Zierer, 2021, p. 13f), these studies engage with the (im)possible futures of education against the background of technological change. Drawing on the past to shape the future can, however, also restrict thought and practice (Macgilchrist et al., 2024). During the Covid-19 pandemic, this became apparent when, for example, key stakeholders took recourse to long-cherished concepts for how schooling should be transformed, rather than going beyond the already-known and well-rehearsed arguments for, e.g., more personalisation, better technology in schools or more effective leadership (Burgos et al., 2021; Zepeda & Lanoue, 2021).

Drawing on Bloch's "principle of hope" (1995), Appadurai's "traces of future" (2021) and Levitas’ "utopia as method" (2013), we utilize a critical utopian approach inspired by Muñoz (2009). The contribution adds insights to what Levitas refers to as “political pragmatism” which “prioritises short-term fixes for problems within the current system” while placing “questions of the viability or justice of that system itself, and certainly radical alternatives […] outside legitimate political debate” (Levitas, 2013, p. 132). Drawing on well-known, pragmatic concepts and approaches can inadvertently render the future smaller and less possible, rather than expanding future possibilities. As Appadurai (2021) argues, the more we think of technological futures, the less space is there for non-technological futures.

Based on interviews with school principals, teachers, (school) social workers and other educational professionals who worked with young people in school and out-of-school settings during the pandemic, this contribution explores which futures they consider desirable. The aim is to illustrate hopes for more socially just, sometimes utopian, futures using concrete, current examples from the reflection of educational practice.

After (i) presenting the theoretical-methodological framework and (ii) discussing the central findings, the paper (iii) reflects on the interviewees' wishes for more solidarity with one another in relation to research on convivial technologies in degrowth societies, debates on technological acceleration and deceleration and contemporary thinking about small revolutions and radical actions in everyday life. The contribution (iv) concludes with methodological reflections for future studies. Overall, the findings provide, we suggest, traces of futures otherwise as they are articulated in the present.

Building on three sets of inspiration from future studies (e.g. Danaher, 2021; Leahy et al., 2019; Facer & Sandford, 2010, Sardar, 2010), this paper draws on interviewees' situated articulations of the present and their hopes for alternative futures. With Bloch (1995) and Appadurai (2013), we thus aim to study hopes as traces into futures. In total, we spoke with 65 school social workers, teachers, school administrators, education policy makers and other people from institutions that provide formal and informal education for children and young adults in Germany. We conducted the semi-structured interviews during and after the pandemic school closures from May 2020 to April 2022. The interviews comprised three sections: first, interviewees’ narratives about their experiences of technology use and social inequality during the school closures; second, their accounts of how they met the challenges they experienced during the pandemic lockdown; third, their reflections on how they imagine a future otherwise. What would society look like if it were in a "utopian enclave" (Jameson, 2007) where the social inequalities they had mentioned had been alleviated? The interviews, which lasted about one hour, were transcribed and rich points identified, i.e., moments that use the interviewer as a research instrument and follow the traces of what seems confusing, unclear, unusual or otherwise requiring explanation and in-depth exploration (Agar, 2006). For this paper, the interview responses to the third section of the interview, i.e., the questions about futures and hopes for society in a utopian enclave, were coded thematically.

The contribution identifies three contemporary themes articulating our interviewees’ hopes for technologically decelerated futures: 1) participation in decision-making, which is linked to the wish for more visibility for young people in the future; 2) mutual care, which is interwoven with the wish for support in the young people’s lives to be more reliable; 3) appreciation for other groups, opinions and ways of life, which is linked to the wish for more future interpersonal understanding. Together they point to the overall yearning for solidarity in community which needs time, occasions, role models and spaces of encounter. Community and solidarity are well-known desires and aims in activism and critical theory. Drawing on recent political theory (e.g. von Redecker, 2023), we will, however, argue that these are radical acts in educational practice that constitute tiny revolutions in contemporary (Global North) societies. While educational policy throughout the pandemic and in the post-pandemic ‘new normal’ has continued to prioritise modernist technological acceleration, these interviews articulate a longing for deceleration. They create visions of the future without a focus on high tech use. If we assume that educational research needs to move "beyond the school to the community, home and workplace" (Facer & Sandford, 2010, p. 74) then, these findings suggest, future research and interventions need to bring together actors from these educationally relevant domains to shape futures otherwise that may or may not elaborate further on enacting solidarity in community.

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