Today, the adjacent possible concept is best seen as a heuristic model designed to create institutional spaces for innovative thinking to develop new ideas and models that adapt rather than challenge existing structures and frameworks. In this way, the adjacent possible can be seen as a heuristic with which to identify nearby and available future possibilities as a complex and dynamic network of interconnected and interdependent possibilities. With respect to this paper, we can conceptualise current NPV models in terms of Kaufman’s ‘actuals’ (heuristic models that aim to overcome the inevitable uncertainties and unpredictability of future investment performance) that set the calculative boundaries of future investment values, whilst ONPV models provide an adjacent possible evolution of the status quo responding to the wider range of investment materialities that are emerging as a function of the future threats and opportunities that are the reality of predicted changes in socio-economic systems, such as climate change, endemic poverty, and limited access to health and social goods in many developing economies. Finally, Beckert’s important work in economic sociology is also of relevance in framing this paper. In 2011, Beckert and Bronck set out a critique of predictive financial analysis as ‘radical uncertainty’ 105 producing ‘uncertain futures’ 106 . They framed their argument as follows: In conditions of uncertainty, economic actors combine calculation with imaginaries and narratives to form ‘fictional’ expectations that coordinate action, express power, and provide the confidence to act. Indeed, we argue that the market impact of shared calculation devices, social narratives, and contingent imaginaries underlines the need for a new form of ‘narrative’ economics and a theory of fictional (rather than rational) expectations. 107 In this context, ‘uncertain futures’ are at the boundary between current reality and what may yet happen as a constructive fiction. The authors argue that simply predicting the future from the past no longer provides all material data needed for effective decision-making. Thus, despite complex and sophisticated calculative technologies the dynamic, and increasingly volatile nature of modern capitalism demands more holistic models of risk and performance measurement. A key element of this is to recognise the importance of the subjective and multivocal interpretation of contingent data.
Beckert (2013, 2016) 108 later extended this work as ‘imagined futures.’ He explained his approach:
I want to add a different perspective on the question of the micro-foundations of economic action, giving weight to a much-underemphasized aspect of it. Starting from the assumption that decision situations in economic contexts are characterized by fundamental uncertainty, I argue that the decision-making of intentionally rational actors is anchored in fictions. By ‘fictions’ I refer to images of some future state of the world or course of events which are cognitively accessible in the present through mental representation.
In this analysis, Beckert went on to highlight three limitations of existing financial models’ ability accurately to calculate the future:
• Rational expectations that transform uncertainty in the future into a state predictable by forecast, allowing for the rational calculation of optimal choices.
105 See for the distinction between radical ‘uncertainty’ and measurable ‘risk’, see Knight (1921) Selection from Risk, Uncertainty and Profit, in The Foundations of Price Theory Vol 3 (pp. 315-359). Routledge. 106 Beckert and Bronck 2011, Uncertain Futures Imaginaries, Narratives, and Calculative Technologies , MPIFG 107 Beckert and Bronck 2011, Uncertain Futures Imaginaries, Narratives, and Calculative Technologies , MPIFG, p.3 108 Beckert 2013 "Imagined futures: fictional expectations in the economy." Theory and society 42, 219-240 and Becker 2016 Imagined Futures: Fictional Expectations and Capitalist Dynamics. Harvard UP. See also, Becker and Brock 2011,
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