A Recent post by John Thackara on Design Observer led me to consider the prospects of design activism gone wrong. Thackara suggests that recent efforts by Architecture for Humanity and AMD, to design and build community internet centers, have missed the boat, as have efforts to design $100 laptops. In his view, other mobile technologies… Continue Reading… Continue Reading
This category contains my answers to questions that often come up regarding my book, The Designers Atlas of Sustainability. Recently I released an upgraded version of the book’s teaching guide, prompting Island Press to ask me some questions about the future of sustainable design education. Q: What is the state of education in sustainable design… Continue Reading
Under the double negative banner “we cannot not change the world” a group has launched a forum for social design. They say, ” The SocialDesignSite aims to foster and facilitate a discourse on social design by establishing a unique interactive platform between everyone interested on the topic. We present innovative projects that help develop and… Continue Reading
I read an interesting piece in the UC Berkeley Alumni magazine, California (yes I’m an alum) about how a single statistic can profoundly change our perspective on an issue–but only if we are presented with it in a certain way (“Numberstruck” by Pat Joseph). UC Berkeley’s Michael Ranney conducted research in which he asked people… Continue Reading… Continue Reading
Previously I wrote about the notion of the economy as being made up of three sectors–public, private, and nonprofit. But recently I’ve seen a few references to “the fourth sector.” The term refers to enterprises, sometimes called social enterprises, that straddle the for-profit and nonprofit divide. social enterprises seem to ask, “how much is enough?”… Continue Reading… Continue Reading
Time to look at some case studies of design activism. Let’s start with a couple of recent projects dealing with the issue of migration between the US and Mexico. Day Labor Station The first project is a day laborer station devised by a nonprofit architecture studio in San Francisco, Public Architecture. Covered in an article… Continue Reading… Continue Reading
link to it over on the right side there, under the “pages” heading…
Some designers are activists, that is to say, they take action (typically within the context of a contentious issue) intended to bring about change on behalf of a wronged or excluded group. But once designers are out of the picture, have moved on to the next job, can artifacts in themselves be activists? Can buildings,… Continue Reading… Continue Reading
The Ulm Foundation in Germany is sponsoring an interesting competition called, “Designing Politics – the Politics of Design” for which the deadline is 10th May 2008 and entries can be from anywhere in the world. The call for entries says that, “Ulm has set itself the task of conducting a discourse on the social responsibility… Continue Reading
If I seem like a booster for the nonprofit sector, it’s because mainly, I am. As I explained in “activism and the economy” I think by and large the nonprofit sector raises the bar for social and environmental performance in the public and private sectors. But recently I’ve come across a few thought-provoking pieces on… Continue Reading… Continue Reading