Systemic design methods and methodologies
The development of systemic design has thus far primarily focused on expanding the methodological repertoire of designers in response to the complexity of contemporary design challenges, with an already substantial literature on methods and methodology in the RSD proceedings. But methods (in both design and research) have consequences beyond their utility. Every method affords seeing and doing some things while obscuring and obstructing others. In this way, methods afford and perpetuate ways of understanding and organising the world much like any other artefact. Because conventions are assumed within the context of a methodological practice, they are difficult to question from within and underlie systemic challenges in the sense of being institutionalised.
As systemic design develops, its conventions, blind spots, and implicit values are forming.
What worlds do these give rise to? In what ways might greater attention on the conceptualisation and presuppositions of (systemic design) methods and methodologies enable more radical opportunities and possibilities? How can systemic design move beyond the individual limitations of systems thinking and design? Could elements of the wider systems field (i.e. beyond the methodological focus of systems thinking) augment or challenge systemic design? In what ways might systemic design’s methodological practices be understood as interventions in the world (in addition to the outcomes of these practices) – modes of living and doing that establish different conventions and build different worlds?
Thanks to those who have proposed and developed the focuses: Christopher Daniel, Gareth Owen Lloyd, Dulmini Perera, Sally Sutherland, Ben Sweeting, James Tooze, Jeffrey P. Turko, and Josina Vink.
Indicative references
- Drew, C., Robinson, C., Winhall, J. (2020). Not the venn: An emergent notion of systemic design which transcends the intersection of design x systems thinking. Proceedings of the Relating Systems Thinking and Design (RSD9) 2020 Symposium. https://rsdsymposium.org/not-the-venn-an-emergent-notion-of-systemic-design-which-transcends-the-intersection-of-design-x-systems-thinking
- Glanville, R. (2015). Living in cybernetics. Kybernetes, 44(8/9), 1174-1179. https://doi.org/10.1108/K-11-2014-0258
- Harding, S. (2015). Objectivity for sciences from below. In F. Padovani, A. Richardson, & J. Y. Tsou (Eds.), Objectivity in Science: New Perspectives from Science and Technology Studies (pp. 35-55). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-14349-1_3
- Krippendorff, K. (2021). From uncritical design to critical examinations of its systemic consequences. Proceedings of the Relating Systems Thinking and Design (RSD10) 2021 Symposium. https://rsdsymposium.org/professor-dr-klaus-krippendorff/
Methods and the worlds they make
New Old Architectures: Interdisciplinary spatial practice
Fran Edgerley and Sofia Deria
Seeing RSD11’s Seven Foci Relationally
Tony Fry
Playing within Systems for Change (The Art Panel)
Ioannis (John) Bardakos, Tegan Bristow, Chris Speed, and Claudia Westermann
Boundary Critique: The work of Werner Ulrich
Desmond Wong
Design with Togetherness: Cooperation among relations, systems, processes
Margherita Vacca
From Discord to Effective Innovation Cycles: Mitigating project team hierarchies
Nicole Norris, Alexis Tennent, Irena Pozgaj-Jones, Adam Dagenais, Joanne Renaux, and Shaun Alfonso
Play Probes For Systemic Design Decisions
Pelin Celik, Olivia Hidalgo Miranda, Tore Gulden, Kristin Støren Wigum, Steen Ory Bendtzen, Nadiya Karibayeva, Florent Orsoni, and Julia Kunkel
Prototyping Interdisciplinary Collaboration
Thomas Maiorana
SOU SOU Workshop: Supporting rituals through ritual, friendship, and play
Michael Schaus, Adrienne Pacini, Cheryl Hsu, and Kimberley Peter
The Age of Planetary Systems Complexity
Perin Ruttonsha
The Book of Iteration: Workshop and introduction to the method
Evan Barba and J.R. Osborn
Unravelling Safety Through Place, People and Things
Swagata Naidu and Sucharita Beniwal
Wordings and Worldings—DALL-E wordplays to visualise alternative metaphors for complex systems
Palak Dudani
Bridging the empathy gap to create systemic value in products
Andreea-Daiana Zavate and Krasimira Bozhinkova
Designing Sustainable Innovation with ‘Inward Fractalization’
Goran Matic and Ana Matic
Making Systemic Design Increasingly Accessible: Building the bench
Chris Oestereich, Praewa Satutum, Courtney Savie Lawrence, and Jett Virangkabutra
Systemic-self and Pluriverse: A design research framework for pluriverse
Mamta Gautam
A Designerly Approach for Transitioning the Construction Industry
Svein Gunnar Kjøde
A Practice for Sympoietic Thinking
Katie Cunningham
A Systemic Design Framework for AI-enabled Healthcare: Improving health and wellbeing of people with learning disabilities
Gyuchan Thomas Jun, Satheesh Gangadharan, Georgina Cosma, Panos Balatsoukas, Cecilia Landa-Avila, Francesco Zaccardi, Michelle O’Reilly, Ashley Akbari, Vasa Curcin, Rohit Shankar, Reza Kiani, Neil Sinclaire, and Chris Knifton
An Empirical Study of Understanding in Order to Act and Acting in Order to Understand in Digital Design Practice
Chitraj Bissoonauth, Christiane Margerita Herr, and Thomas Fischer
Are Systemic Design Methods Excluding People with Learning Disabilities?
Irma Cecilia Landa-Avila, Satheesh Gangadharan, Sarah Rabbitte, Amy Wilkins, Michelle O’Reilly, Neil Sinclair, Chris Knifton, Panagiotis Balatsoukas, Rohit Shankar, and Gyuchan Thomas Jun
Boundaries as Connection Points: Expanding systemic design methodologies through an “elastic toggling” process
Haley Fitzpatrick and Tobias Luthe
Complex Urban Futures: Using scenarios to tackle the complexity of megaregional systems
Henry Endemann, Joern Buehring, and Gerhard Bruyns
Commoning by Design: Staying relational in conflict
Julia Schaeper
Crafting Systemic Design
Amishi Vadgama
Cybernetic Musings on Open Form(s)
Claudia Westermann
Design for a Time Between Worlds
Tara Campbell and Cheryl Hsu
Designing Infrastructures of Care: An exploration of listening and slowness for socio-ecological wellbeing
Rachel J. Wilson
Embedding Systemic Design Practices in an Experienced International Development Design Studio
Frida Lizeth Gomez Poblette and Pieter Jan Stappers
Facing Systemic Challenges with Epistemic Humility
Michael Troop
Institutionalizing New Civic Learning Traditions: Nurturing design practice in planning cultures
Tom Flanagan, Alexander N. Christakis, and Maria Kakoulaki
Leverage Is Fractal, Relative… And What Else? We need a theory of leverage in systemic design
Ryan Murphy
Mapping Future Oriented Design Practices
Irem Tekogul
Navigating Wicked Futures Through More-Than-Human Perspectives: Experiments in design education
Danielle Barrios-O’Neill, Laura Dudek, Nirit Binyamini Ben Meir, Elena Falomo, Charlotte Jarvis, and Carolina Ramirez-Figueroa
Ontological Design for Robotics
Steve Battle
Portfolio Design Stencils: A conceptual and design architecture for accelerating social systems transformation
Luca Gatti and Gina Belle
Practicing Architecture In The Distinction
Ben Spong
SOU SOU: Supporting transitions through ritual, friendship and play
Cheryl Hsu, Adrienne Pacini, Kimberley Peter, and Michael Schaus
Systemic Relational Insights: A new hybrid intelligence approach to make sense of complex problems
Andrea Cattabriga
The Frog that Leaped
Helen Avery
Towards Relational Design Practices: De-centering design through lessons from community organising
Erica Dorn and Tara Dickman
Toward an Eco-Social perspective: How to design in time of trouble
Margherita Vacca, Francesco Cantini, Alessio Tanzini, and Fabio Ballerini
Trapped in Complexity: Worlds and the methods they make
Håkan Edeholt
Use Systems Oriented Design (SOD) for implementation
Andreas Wettre and Christodoulos Christodoulou
Verksted—A Networked Space for Collaborative Sense-Making
Francis D’Silva
What to Make of the Appropriation of Autopoiesis in Architecture?
Guillermo Sánchez Sotés, Christiane M. Herr, and Thomas Fischer
Designing Regenerative Systems: Opportunities for Hemsedal
Haley Fitzpatrick and Tobias Luthe
Developmental design for healthcare sustainability – Synthesis map 1.0
Pranay Arun Kumar and Peter Jones
Mirror in the Bathroom
Ben Spong