Design is visual but more than that it’s not. It’s behavioral economics. It’s systems. It’s policies. It’s processes. It’s language. It’s marketing. It’s manipulation. It’s persuasion. And though many claim human centred design exists to enhance our world, indeed to design our lives, it has often been used against what is truly human and what is a better outcome for humanity.
A mantra I find myself repeating in environmentalism a lot the past few years is that we need to choose better problems. I’m a long retired optimist of ideas that will magically resolve our problems. In the environment, pretty much everything at scale will cause us issues with seven to ten billion people, regardless of how good the solution is.
Even the circular economy & circular design, though I claim to be party to it, stings with privilege. Before designers came along and changed the system, the world was already largely circular. Ask any First Nations person.
After having created all the problems, we’re now claiming we have a new answer (one that certainly doesn’t solve for all of the issues nor address the business models they stem from).
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