Marleen van Gerner, Jairo da Costa, and Dulaj Perera
In this paper, we examine how to support residents in maintaining engagement with their living environment over time, using the Trudo Tower, a social housing community developed by Trudo, as a case study. We adopt a combined Systems Thinking and Participatory Design approach to investigate how the community functions and how residents perceive their living experience. We conducted interviews and observations to develop a system map, identify system archetypes, and uncover underlying mental models. We then facilitated a co-creation session with community members to deepen our understanding of their needs and aspirations.
Findings indicate that framing the challenge as “residents ‘taking responsibility’ for their living environment” does not resonate with residents. We therefore reframe the objective from fostering responsibility to creating opportunities for meaningful engagement with the living environment. Guided by this reframing, we developed and evaluated a design intervention: the Thuis-in-de-Toren (Home-in-the-Tower) calendar, which supports new residents during their move-in period and fosters community engagement. The intervention provides practical information, reflective prompts, encouragement to participate, and invitations for exploration, while integrating seamlessly into Trudo’s existing processes without increasing staff workload. Our evaluation shows that Trudo perceives the calendar as visually appealing, relevant, and a valuable addition to the onboarding process. Participants in the evaluation also consider the implementation feasible and recognise its potential applicability beyond the Trudo Tower to other social housing buildings developed by Trudo.
We conclude that responsibility should not be understood as a predefined role assigned to residents, but rather as something that may emerge when residents are provided with meaningful opportunities to engage in ways that reflect their interests and needs. We conceptualise responsibility as a situated interpretation that is shaped and reframed in relation to residents’ perspectives. This study contributes to ongoing discussions on pluralism in Systemic Design by demonstrating how integrating Systems Thinking and Participatory Design enables a dialogue among multiple ways of knowing: analytical, experiential, and situated, across institutional (housing corporation) and lived-experience (resident) perspectives. By bringing forward residents’ lived experiences in the reframing process, we show how dominant problem framings can be challenged and rearticulated to support more inclusive and meaningful forms of engagement.
Keywords: social housing, living environment, community engagement, participatory design, systems thinking, system map, systems archetypes