Participatory Design and “democratising innovation”

One of the prominent issues outlined within the paper relates to how there has been a shift from how democracy in participatory design is perceived. The traditional ideas in design are considered to be about creating physical objects or services (“things”) whereas now the interpretation lends itself to defining socio-material (“Things”) which can portray themselves as services, principles, ideas, legislation, social movement or interventions (or a combination of them). These “Things” are the outcome of what Bjorgvinsson describes as “democratising innovation” which incorporate conflict throughout the process (the whole process: i.e. selection to enactment) to reach an outcome. Infrastructuring is consistently associated with socio-materials and is interpreted as an ongoing process in which should establish networks of working relations or long-term relationships.  Bjorgvinsson refers to the latter process as “Thinging and infrastructuring of innovation interventions” and he bases this interpretation on two projects which he uses as examples within the paper.

The two projects within the paper (Malmo Living Labs and Herrgards Women Association) both focus on the creation of “Things” whereby they both helped to instil technology and infrastructure albeit with controversy throughout the process. In both cases the projects focused on two separate groups who felt they had been excluded from society. Each project’s primary objectives were to increase the visibility of the groups, enabling better integration and engagement as well as reduce associated stigmatisation of the groups within society. Controversy and conflict came about when collaborating with external companies and organisations. Bjorgvinsson refers to one contentious event explaining how one company had “split emotions”  on collaborating with another company due to the locations in which they conducted business and reflected on how the partnership might be impacted.

In conclusion, democratising innovation suggests similar concepts outlined within agonistic pluralism (Carl DiSalvo) which promote conflict to raise alternative questions and viewpoints. The idea of using conflict as a tool for socio-material construct is most certainly a unique idea but arguably occurs naturally when engaging in projects that are “community” orientated or where there are multiple stakeholders involved.

The paper I have chosen that exemplifies participatory design is one I closely referred to within my Master’s thesis surrounding public displays by former Open Lab researcher, Nick Taylor: <Available here>