Characterising Futuring Strategies for Biodiverse Speculative Design and Systems Design Craig Jeffcott 1,2(&) and Ana Margarida Ferreira 1,2 1 IADE, Universidade Europeia, Lisbon, Portugal craig@biodiverse-futures.org, ana.margarida.ferreira@universidadeeuropeia.pt 2 UNIDCOM/IADE, Unidade de Investigação em Design e Comunicação, Lisbon, Portugal Abstract. In this paper, it is proposed that new tools and techniques for speculative design practice are needed to guarantee the biodiversity of global systems, and that they can be based in the non-normative strategies of futuring that exist within culturally diverse and ecologically-engaged communities. Furthermore, these tools and techniques can be used to build an ecology-centred practice of speculative design for community action. Taking a research through design approach that draws on critical theories of ecosophy, queer ecology and queer futures, the presented research, as a part of an ongoing doctoral work, aims to characterise the futuring strategies of such communities through par- ticipant and desk-based qualitative research. Preliminary reflections are that the communitarian and ecological future-making strategies described in theory are present in material and imaginative practices. Such strategies are multi-faceted and richly contextual and resonate across theoretical, practical and speculative domains. Moreover, these approaches possess common and recurring aspects of care-taking, non-linear temporality, relationality, storytelling, and playfulness. Keywords: Speculative design Á Systems design Á Cultural diversity Á Biodiversity Á Queer ecology Á Queer futures Á Sustainable social change 1 Introduction This ongoing doctoral research project aims to explore the potential of non-normative and ecological futuring strategies to underpin speculative design tools and techniques that are diverse, ecology-centred and impactful. The hope is that such strategies can form part of a more sustainable speculative design practice, and contribute to positive and sustainable social change, and biodiversity and community activism. This paper reports on the first phase of this research project, which is to learn about non-normative futuring strategies, through participant based research with diverse and ecologically-engaged communities, and through desk-based research and strategy mapping. This research builds towards an original framework for developing novel specu- lative design techniques, which will be deployed in a community speculative design © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 W. Karwowski et al. (Eds.): IHSED 2020, AISC 1269, pp. 277–282, 2021. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-58282-1_44