Changing the change

This post has been written by Ezio Manzini and Jorge Frascara

Changing the Change ended two weeks ago. Concluding it, we felt enthusiastic: our emotional impression was the one of having participated in a very meaningful event. Now we are two weeks later. We have had the time to recover, rethink and digest the many stimuli … And we are still enthusiastic and convinced that Changing the Change has been a very meaningful event.

Given this enthusiasm a question arises immediately (one that has been asked by may friends): what will the next steps be? Frankly speaking, we don’t know yet: we need some other weeks of rethinking, recovering and discussing. Nevertheless, something, some “next steps”, already appear clearly:

1. A conference is a conference. Paraphrasing Magritte, with this statement we intend to say that we don’t have to ask to a conference more than what a conference can do. And a conference is a mainly a place of exchanges: we say something to others, we listen to others’ thoughts and experiences, and, if it is a good conference, we bring back home something useful in terms of new relationships and ideas. Given that, the only next steps that a conference has to generate are the ones that every participant will take on the basis of the new ideas and relationships that he/she will have brought home.
   In the Changing the Change case, will this happen? Of course we hope so. But it is not up to the organizer to take these steps. It is up to you. The blog in the conference site will remain active (at least for some months): let us know if some of these steps have been taken.
2. A conference is also a book: a collection of papers that permits to those who had not had the opportunity to participate, to have an idea of what had been said at the conference, and get the address of who said it. And so, again, through its proceedings, a good conference may generate ideas and relationships.
   In our case, the conference proceedings have already been published and you can find them on line in the Changing the Change site. Everybody interested can read them and, if very interested, download all the papers.
3. In principle, what has be said in the two previous points could be true for every conference, both the virtual and traditional ones. But traditional conferences have a different potential in terms of community building. In fact, they are places where you bring not only your ideas, but also your body. And this is what, in a successful conference, can make the difference. As everybody knows, physical interactions help the creation of a sense of community.
   Changing the Change was a conference specifically dedicated to designer-researchers who think that sustainability should be the meta-objective of every design research. This large group of researchers has been until now rather weak and invisible. A very positive Changing the Change next step could be the empirical observation that this group has evolved towards a community. If this will be true or not, if this next step will be taken, it is now too early to be said. In this case too, we hope to see something on the Changing the Change Blog.
4. A conference may generate a final document: a text that captures the “conference spirit”. Changing the Change did it too. It produced a document where themes that appeared to the conference participants to be relevant (in the perspective of sustainability) and demanding (in terms design knowledge) are indicated. This document, the Design Research Agenda – Draft 1, clearly could be considered as another “next step” of the conference: the possibility to use the emerging issues that the conference has produced as “attractors,” capable of orienting a multiplicity of on-going and brand new design research programs.
   
   Maybe this document could be seen as the most evident next step of Changing the Change. But its meaning has to be attentively considered and its possible practical implications discussed.

   The Design Research Agenda has been presented in its first version, the Draft 1, as an open and collaborative research program. An open program, because it can be continuously integrated with other ideas and themes. And a collaborative program, because it is based on a p2p approach: each research team can bring its “contents” and consolidate a research line. That is, if it accepts some general visions and simple rules, each research team can bring its programs and its results into the system, contributing to consolidating and, possibly, reorienting some larger streams of research. The aim is moving from a multiplicity of researches in different directions (and incapable of interacting and of creating a clear image of what, as a whole, they are doing) to the possibility of mutually interacting and generating the design knowledge needed to produce larger and stronger visions and proposals.

   As a matter of fact, this same document (the Design Research Agenda – Draft 1) has been generated in a p2p spirit: a series of formalized and informal discussions that, during the three days of the conference, progressively defined the proposed “emerging issues”. In conclusion, we could say that the first next step has been taken during the same conference , and it has produced this draft. Now, the next step is to see if this idea could work. Please, read the Design Research Agenda for Sustainablity text and let us know what you think.

   Thank you!

A long time ago someone has said “you shall love your neighbor as yourself”. It is a challenging principle in a time where happiness often is achieved by ignoring your neighbor rights and needs. However, searching for sustainable ways of living requires from us the adoption of a principle far more challenging: “you shall love people of future generations that you don´t even know that will exist and that are not even necessarily related to you”. If the previous principle has already proved to be difficult to implement, if not impossible in many regions of the globe, what could be said about this late enlarged principle?

Hence, I understand that the most fundamental (radical) improvement that could lead the all society towards sustainability lies on the human spirit. Using the words of our colleague Geetha Narayanan (Newsletter 07): that is what makes each of us humans, that which endures beyond matter.

Yes, induction of market forces can drive sustainability forward faster. Yes, speeding up changes in consumption patterns can be achieved through education. And, yes, we should work to include sustainability on the main agenda of every world leader. However, it is the values we hold, the beliefs we cherish and the ideals to which we are dedicated are determinants on the future we are shaping today and that is beyond conventional design.

Some people could say that improvements on the human spirit are outside of the scope of design. Contrary to this opinion I believe that Design as well as any other profession can make a direct contribution to changes or improvements in the society values and aspirations and that does not mean transforming design into a religion. Improving the transparency on the ethics of production of a given product or implementing processes that enable consumer´s co-responsibility for a product life cycle are examples of how designers can operate as channels for positive change.

In South America design clearly is far from delivering the changes that it potentially could provide or induce. The good news is that emergent changes on the direction of sustainability are expanding in numbers, involving since large corporations until self-employed workers operating in their own home.
On many of these cases the change is so positive that theme for design could be more “supporting-the-change” or “disseminating-the-change” than actually change the change. At the same time, the continent currently presents large economical and social changes that in many instances replicate environmental or social mistakes that have already being made by developed nations in the past. Here is an opportunity to change the change.

Até a Conferência!

In Spanish, Design is written with ñ, Diseño, and although it could sound… banal, that ñ gives account of an original way to face the world.
That single letter talks about a huge difference regarding the way in which design is assumed, because for us, in the countries where the ñ is used, design is the art of “darse maña” (meaning the ability to use ones “knacks” to solve a given challenge).

The inventors of this funny letter were monks who had to fit just one metallic movable type, instead of two, in the mechanical press; they gave themselves the “maña” to make the sound (usually written with gn or nh) fit that single space…

Now, how many monks or “mañosos” are there going to be attending the CtC conference?

Would the activation of “maña” offer new insights regarding possibilities to improve life conditions in urban dwellings?
An initial answer is what I would like to share here by means of a personal exploration during the PhD research.

As a student, I remember having arrived in Italy with lots of expectations among which, the idea of learning about “sustainable” supermarkets being this idea a clear sign of my lack of vision regarding the way in which the design practice has stuck on mainstream possibilities of producing with LCA standards, eco-materials, etc., a way that neglects the urgency to develop a design culture and thus hinders the real need for research.

While being immersed in the design world, and while starting to address the relevance of looking the “mañosos” ways in a series of case study cities, I found out that a hybrid car, a more accurate LCA, a “sustainable” supermarket do help, but are not the actual solution; indeed it seems that what is needed is having design as a prompter of creative behaviours at a private/personal scale so that “users” feel encouraged to change, to fit into the planetary limited conditions; design/diseño then can help awaking user’s “non-professional” creativity (their mañas), to solve on self-basis daily needs. And this, let’s face it, will not “extinct” designers, rather than that, it will open brand new possibilities.
Along the way I found designers feeling threatened because, “if we don’t give shape to a product or a service then: what are we called to do?!”. For many, design is call to develop eco-products, toolkits, guidelines… but fortunately those stances are changing. Nowadays it is acknowledgeable that designers could help users not just to consume “better” but, to consume less.

I hope that the CtC will not be a moment to blissful talk and easily agreement but that discussions and positive disagreements (between designers coming from all over the world and thus using all sorts of eñes”) take place, so that the resulting agenda (which undeniable addresses a political phenomena) help us to face the “mañana” (Spanish for tomorrow) with more…: maña.

I think that the Conference should produce, as final document, a design research agenda for sustainability: a short text where emerging themes are focalised and promising directions of research are indicated.

I know that saying this involves some risks: conference final documents are quite common and often they are nothing more than rhetorical declarations of good intentions. This is true. But I think that we have to take this risk: the meeting of a worldwide community of design researchers is, in my view, both a cultural and a political event. And an event like this should leave a trace (in the community’s culture) and give directions (about future steps to be taken). Not only: in a previous design conference (the Cumulus Design Conference in Kyoto of March 28, a declaration was signed – see Yrio Sotamaa in the Newsletter 5). I think that this Declaration, having been signed by a large number of design schools, is not only highly symbolic (having being signed in Kyoto) but also potentially relevant. Now, of course, something has to happen to implement it. The design research agenda for sustainability that I am proposing, in my view, should be considered as one of Kyoto Declaration possible implementations: a document that will have to give research directions in order to develop the necessary design knowledge to make it real. That is, for us, to Change the Change.

In this perspective, some organisational choices involving the Conference and its preparation have been taken to facilitate a process that, in a bottom-up and peer-to-peer spirit, should be able to generate shared ideas. In practical terms, during the first two and half days of the conference, listening to the presented papers, participating to the initial Round Table, talking in the bar or whatever else conference-related conversations take place, the participants will progressively focalise on the themes that, in the Changing the Change perspective, will appear as the most relevant and demanding in terms of design knowledge. In the Conference last session these themes will be discussed in different meetings and, finally, in the general assembly.

In conclusion, in parallel to the selected paper presentations, that is, the “academic stream” (that of course will be the core of the Conference), there will be also a “political stream”: an open space aimed at giving participants more possibilities to interact, to bring their own ideas and to collaborate on the preparation of a final document. This political stream will be a bottom-up process of theme definition oriented to build, in a participatory way, the design research agenda for sustainability” that will be the Conference final output and (hopefully) the first step of some post-conference actions.

In order to concretely move in this direction, this discussion should start now and should regard both the anticipation of some emerging themes and the proposal on how to facilitate, during the Conference, their definition process. These Newsletters and the blog on the CtC Website are places where this discussion could easily happen.

The Zebra Question is a poem by Shel Silverstein in which he poses the conundrum of order and causality embedded in our contemporary view or perspective of life. Is a zebra black with white stripes he asks or is it white with black stripes? and so on!

Perhaps we might ask, in a similar vein, if it is design and design thinking that will allow us to build a sustainable and fair world beyond 2020, or will it be that dominant visions of the world of 2020 will determine the scope, nature and field of what design is today in the year 2008?

Or perhaps we need to move beyond such simplistic and reductionist conundrums to some essential and core realizations that must underpin substantive dialogue on change.

A beginning might be to realize and accept, as David Orr and others put it, that all education, including design education must pivot around the human condition, the human prospect and the human spirit.

An addition to this would be the realization that the human condition, prospect and spirit is linked closely to our home –our mother ship, our Gaia, our earth. The earth defines the material, the matter that forms the fundamental core of our existence. It plays a big role in defining both the human condition and the human prospect.

A third realization could be centered around the understanding that contemporary discourses on matter such as the ones on sustainability, slowness or on change omit a vital part of what makes each of us human- our spirit-that which endures beyond matter and is what defines each of us as living beings on this planet- described by Carl Sagan as “the pale blue dot”

All of us, who are engaged in being critical about our societies and our futures, must learn to pose serious and challenging conundrums around these and other similar critical realizations. Using the power of the conundrum to generate genuine, equitable and critical dialogues, ones that do not focus on the generation of a series of reassuring lies but which deals with “impossible things” and ‘inconvenient truths” would result in powerful conversations on change. It will play a vital and informative role, at conferences such as Changing the Change in generating both the skeptical and the critical view of design enabled futures.

The Changing the Change conference offers an opportunity to question dominant paradigms in design, including contemporary paradigms such as sustainability thinking and green design. There is a real need today for designers, educators and thinkers to question the idea of development, not in isolation but together with notions of equity, of social and environmental justice and in doing this consider carefully the needs of both the people and the planet.

To me that would imply Changing the Change!

Changing the Change is an opportunity to visualize the opportunities and responsibilities of a better world. This is not the world of the past, a world to which we cannot return. That world was never perfect, and we cannot be what we once were. Neither is it an impossible future of utopian central planning. That future is also behind us.

Changing the Change is a chance to think our way through the different futures we can hope to inhabit, examining these futures designers.

Every human institution is embedded in an historically contingent ecology of societies and cultures. These influence every human institution, artifact, and agency.

“It’s impossible to change one thing,” John Collier once said, “without changing everything. But you can’t change everything all at once. You’ve got to start somewhere.”

Nevertheless, John didn’t believe that change is hopeless or impossible. He believed that we must learn more and do better, working with resolve and commitment to create the world we want to live in.

Genuine change involves each of us. Changing the Change is an opportunity to see how we can change ourselves to change the societies and cultures in which we live.

A remarkable work of art on the theme of change has been circulating around the world. It is drawn from the words of a political candidate, but it is not part of a political campaign. It is an unofficial campaign ad for hope, inviting citizens to be a voice and cast a vote. You can see the work for yourself at:

http://www.dipdive.com/

This could be the campaign ad for Changing the Change. It calls neither for utopia nor for business as usual.

Changing the Change is an opportunity to use design tools and design thinking to envision and shape a common future.

What I find so inspiring and realistic about Changing the Change is the understanding that we must reshape our cultures and ourselves to reshape our future. To bring change about, we must change the way we change.

Gandhi said, “As human beings, our greatness lies not so much in being able to remake the world … as in being able to remake ourselves.”

See you in Torino!

Changing the change is a very “Chinese” theme as China is experiencing such sweeping changes, covering almost all aspects of society, which can hardly be seen in most other countries.

Chinese people are optimistic, most of them believe that the future will be better than today. Local designers also think that they are experiencing a historical era marked by a leap from “Manufacturing China” to “Creative China”. The whole society is being driven by a huge engine called “development”. As a result, people don’t always have enough time to think and rethink in-depth, but such introspection is so necessary when seeking a sustainable future.

This Changing the change conference offers an opportunity for Chinese designers: to rethink and re-evaluate the changes that are happening or have happened in our life-world, no matter whether huge or tiny; to rethink and compare the present physical spaces, social-culture and life styles with what they used to be; to rethink the position, values, trends and possible social responsibilities of design education, design practice and design research.

In this era of globalization, eastern designers are duty-bound to put forward their views on these questions as critical regionalists. Today, sustainable development may be the only universal ethic. To realize this ideal, not only are science and technology needed at product level, but also at the system and the ethical level. We Chinese have to admit in shame that our ancestors lived a far more sustainable life style than we do today. This fact is constantly reminding us that many aspects and changes in our life-world should be re-evaluated and re-designed.

In Chinese, the word “she ji” stands for “design”, and its original meaning was “establish a strategy”. It originated from military affairs. The Chinese “she ji” design system has already been running successfully for thousands of years, long before Le Corbusiers began to teach us what design is and how to design. The most interesting thing is that the softer Chinese “she ji” concept exactly coincides with certain tendencies in today’s design, such as “vision”, “system” or “strategic” design, etc.

In traditional Chinese ideology, human and nature have always been regarded as a whole, the human body and the outside world are both complicated systems sharing many common characteristics. This kind of understanding together with respect and love of nature leads to a world of balance and harmony (the Chinese meaning of “sustainable”). Actually, the traditional philosophy, ways of thinking and life styles which were once rashly abandoned, may exactly meet the needs of sustainable development. Chinese designers should think about this and let the other part of this planet know what and how they are thinking and doing. On this level, “design research” is not only a tool for designers to think, explore and solve problems, not only a tool to criticize and introspect, but also more of a language to communicate with other worldwide designers.

China is experiencing the most rapid change in the world, and at the same time, China may also be the ideal place to realize any strategies for change. All we have to do now is to find and to “she (set up )” a right and good “ji” “vision and strategy”, not only for the design discipline itself but also for the whole human world?