Utopia, Hope and Desire in Education Futures

This paper explores the intersection of utopian imagination with higher education, addressing the opportunities and tensions between pragmatic, holistic and transversal utopias and their place within education theory and practice. In response to contemporary crises in higher education, we argue that we must reimagine educational futures by broadening the frameworks through which utopian educational institutions, systems and practices can be imagined and critiqued. Working with the multiplicity of educational utopias and emphasising the conflicting framings of pragmatic and holistic utopias (Bayne, 2023; Nørgård & Holflod, 2024; Webb, 2016), the paper uses the idea of transversal future-making and the ‘placeness’ of utopia to discuss how it might be mobilised in the design of educational futures. These theoretical approaches are illustrated and examined through two examples from future-making in education – Speculative Higher Education Futures and Playtopias.