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Module 7.1 Clarifying the purpose and structure of the scenario exercise
6 Careful planning and thinking in the early stages will significantly improve the quality of any scenario

exercise. Some of the most important questions to ask right away are why you are doing the

exercise, who should be involved and what are the key elements required to structure the process.
In some cases, the steps described in this phase have been done at the start of a scenario exercise,
9-12 December, 2013 the process is well underway and the scenarios are already (partially) developed. This can lead to
but in a fairly informal and ad hoc manner. In other cases, they are only really treated explicitly once

problems later on in that it can be difficult to use the scenarios developed to address the issues of

interest in the detail desired. At the same time, there should be enough flexibility for revisiting each of
these steps, as much will be learned throughout the process. Thus, the outcome of what is presented
in this phase should not be seen as set in stone for the whole length of the exercise.

a. Establishing the nature and scope of the scenarios

Purpose

To establish a clear view of the scenario process to be used.

Output(s)

The output or outputs from this step should be a clear overview of and plan for the scenario
process. The specific details of the plan will depend on the type of scenarios chosen and other
factors, e.g. available resources. This includes such factors as, time horizon, balance between narrative

and quantitative elements, nature of policy analysis and available resources for exercise.

Steps

1. The core team running the exercise, perhaps in consultation with the funders and key
stakeholders, should ask themselves the following questions (please note that the second
and third of these are very slight modifications of the questions discussed in the previous
section on policy analysis).

* What are the issues we want addressed in the scenario project? If it is part of a larger assessment,
how are these addressed in the other sections of the assessment?

* Are there existing policies we wish to explore as part of the exercise? Are the effects of these of
such magnitude that they would fundamentally alter the basic structure of the scenarios?

* Do we have a preconceived end vision, or at least some aspects of a vision, such as specific
targets, for the scenarios?

34 Scenario Development and Analysis