Imaginary future generations: A deliberative approach for intergenerational sustainability dilemma

The current generation affects future generations, but the opposite is not true. This one-way nature of the dependence of generations is the leading cause of many intergenerational problems, such as climate change. These problems are characterized by the fact that the current generation tends to choose actions to their benefit without considering future generations, which we call the intergenerational sustainability dilemma (ISD). This paper designs and implements deliberation experiments representing ISD with a single generation of three people and examines how the dilemma can be solved. Imaginary future generations (IFG) is suggested as a treatment in which one person in the current generation is asked to be a representative from the future without any obligations. We analyze the recorded deliberation of generation decisions. We find that intergenerational sustainability is enhanced through deliberations when one generational member emerges naturally as a neutral icebreaker to deliberate (neutral icebreaker is defined as a person who voluntarily opens and activates the deliberation from a neutral standpoint) and/or IFG is present in a generation. Specifically, we demonstrate that when an icebreaker and/or IFG is present during deliberation, generation brings a wider variety of ideas and viewpoints about the ISD, leading to intergenerational sustainability. This research illustrates how a deliberative analysis can be usefully combined with economic experiments as a methodology to reveal human behaviors and preferences for intergenerational decision making.