What better to inaugurate a blog on social design thinking than some thinking on “Social Design” ?
Is it just me or is “Social Design” really everywhere now? Possibly it’s just my perception, shaped by the fact that this is my daily work. Nonetheless, if you don’t find exactly “social” and “design” as matches, you will surely get one of these -
design for development, responsible design, systemic design, service design, lifestyle design, holistic design, deep design, mindful design, intentional design, strategic design, eco design, sustainable design, green design, meta design, emotion design, slow design, experience design, user-centred design, user friendly design, interaction design, or even smart design.
Clearly, I am putting way too many different fruits in the apple basket, and some of these labels only remotely relate to social design. But I do often get the feeling that claiming a new or emerging design label has become in itself a design exercise.
One can ask oneself why are today’s designers so prone to inventing new tags for setting themselves apart from the rest of the industry. And, perhaps more importantly, could we be running the risk of witnessing truly important movements such as social design pass us by as one more trend? Can “Social Design” become just one more catchphrase?
Or in contrast, given it seems to be in everybody’s mouth these days, is “Social Design” finally achieving such a state of ubiquity within the design process and debate, i.e., an all prevailing presence, from discourse and thinking, to practice and doing - that it will soon be not even worth mentioning it? So intrinsic to design that it would make social design sound redundant?
How would the design world look like then?
Well at least I know this blog would have to change its name, and simply be called
“www.designblog.org”
2 Comments, Comment or Ping
Jon Ramer
Hi, I discovered your blog on wiserearth. I respect and appreciate the work you are doing, thank you. Language conceals and reveals therefore naming the domain social design is the best place to start. I wonder what are the human concerns that social design is the solution for?
Jan 6th, 2009
joanabertholo
Dear Jon,
Thank you for taking the time to go through the blog, and to post. Naming a blog SocialDesign, as naming a movement social design, as I see it, has a wise and a risky part to it. “Social Design” is so broad that it runs the risk of including literally every outcome of human action, both conscious and unconscious and hence - everything we do (and think, and feel, and are). On another hand, keeping the scope that broad allows to bring to light a multitude of views and perspectives we otherwise wouldn’t. So, in the end, I believe in maintaining some criteria, but mostly learning to cope with diversity and impermanence. What social design means today will be constantly updated - tomorrow, the day after, and so forth.
I also see a difference between using language to label, differentiate and widen the gap of our separation to each other (ultimately the root of all our modern crisis) and using language to help us find some reason in the mist of all the chaotic manifestation of phenomena, i.e., the world.
I hope that by choosing this claim, social design, and fostering a debate on what that could mean, we are helping to bring each other closer, and not further apart.
Finally, to answer your question, I’m afraid social design in itself is not the solution for anything. I can’t speak for our team here, merely for myself, but I believe in the power of this claim to bring people closer through self-analysis, debate and constructive dialogue. Solutions, for me, will lie in the construction and participation of new social visions (more engaged, more connected, more compassionate, more awakened). Nevertheless, Social Design can be a great tool for the initial phase of any problem-solving process: recognizing we have a problem.
Jan 8th, 2009
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