way of shaping and understanding the world. Islam can provide a matrix and methodology for tackling problems and generating future choices and possibilities for Muslim societies. 2: Muslims must perceive themselves as being a civilisation, rather than members of a set of fragmented nation states. This is the only way to avoid stagnation and marginalisation. 3: Plurality and diversity must become the cornerstones of Islam. 4: Shaping viable and desirable futures for a Muslim civilisation must involve the active participation of communities and conscious effort at consultation (shura) at all levels of society with the aim of achieving a broad consensus (ijma). 5: To shape desirable alternative futures, Muslims must engage constructively with the contemporary world in all its dimensions. Sardar also argues that the future has already been colonised to a very large extent. Forecasting, prediction and other methods of studying are often used by larger nations in their attempts to control smaller ones. Sardar says: "To keep the future open to all potentials, alternatives and dissenting possibilities, Sardar believes that it is necessary to envisage alternative futures from different civilisational and cultural perspectives." He has argued further that futurology itself is not a discipline with rigid boundaries, fixed theories, esoteric terminology and ‘great men’ but an inter- and trans-disciplinary discourse that must emphasise open and pluralistic alternative futures. In a well cited paper, he presented Sardar's Four Laws of Futurology: Futurology are wicked (that is, they deal with complex, interconnected problems steeped in uncertainty and ignorance in a playway way); Futurology emphasise Mutually Assured Diversity (MAD), to ensure that diversity not only survives but thrives in any desirable future; Futurology are sceptical (of all popular futuristic projections and currents which are essentially attempts to colonize the future); and futurology are futureless – ‘since we can have no true knowledge of the future, the impact of all futures explorations can only be meaningfully assessed in the present’ and the true relevance of all futures exploration lies in the present. Identity and multiculturalism Sardar has written extensively on identity. He shares with the psychologist and philosopher from India, Ashis Nandy, the idea that humans do not have one but multiple identities. Identity, he argues, is not monolithic and static; but multiple and ever-changing. He has said: "Many categories of identity that we have conventionally projected on others – such as the ‘evil Orientals’, the ‘inferior races of the colonies’, the