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An unorthodox Interaction Design.

Key Words: Disruption, unorthodox, design activism, interaction design, crisis, critical

awareness, Social change, citizen

Abstract

Today, we are facing one of the biggest and deepest Crises of the modern human history.

Under those circumstances, the already existing design tools seem unable and inefficient to

provide a possible way out. The design process, as we know it and practice it, is either an

offspring of, or tied up with, the same mechanisms that creates the crisis. Such mechanisms

are the free markets, the globalization and the capitalism that controlled by the tightly

intertwined media, multinational companies and governments and their only desire is the

profit through the deception and manipulation of the citizens. It is not exaggeration to claimthat is now that the need for re-designing Design, from a material oriented to a human

oriented process, is more urgent than ever.

Therefore, on this paper I will attempt to combine the field of interaction design (IxD) with

the notions of design activism (DA). I will explain how and why this combination leads to the

shift of the focal point of the IxD, from the user to the citizen and from the digital product to

the society itself. Moreover, I will end up with a, maybe not new, but consciously

unorthodox way to practice IxD, using important findings from, one, the General System

Theory (GST) about the interactivity in between the living organisms and two, the

Permaculture Theory (PT) about the reformation of the designer’s practice in a more

sustainable perspective. Finally, I planned an activity to test how this theory will work, at

least in this early face, and to give me crucial information about its continuation and

development. All in all, once you claim that you design for the people and the society, you

must go public and let them put your ideas to the test. 

CRISIS

The nowadays Crisis, in the economical social and political context, was the starting point

for this project. A Crisis, that if you look a little bit closer, actually, it’s not so new[4][5]

 and it’s

not only economical, political and social. The true Crisis is deeper and it’s about the people’s

awareness, ethics and critical thinking

[8]

. It’s a Crisis of our way of living in general

[10]

, and ithas different versions depending the geographical place, the economic situation etc.

More specific, the Crisis exists in the problematic functions of the free markets, the trend

of the privatization of the public sector and in the mechanisms of globalization and mass

consumption[5]

. Undeniably, it’s quite obvious that, nobody can provide an easy design

solution, or at least a design process that, somehow, will make a fertile ground for potential

solutions, regarding this global issue. The conventional design focuses on the material and

not to the spiritual development, and because of that, it seems incapable to generate the

foundations for solutions. Nevertheless, in some cases, it is part of the problem, or even

more, it is the problem itself. More specific, the list of the “unethical” companies, that, for

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the sake of profit, they transfer their production in the less developed countries that are

constantly accused for poor human and work rights, is endless[12]

.

But here is the possible design solution to this problem. We must find a way to redesign

Design. Moreover, the target group of this redesigned Design must be the designers

themselves. But someone will say that this approach to this problem is impossible andlimited, but the only limitation is the limitation of information and imagination of the

designer and his fixed attitudes[7]

. If we do that, if we focus on the core of the design process

we can alter the person, from a passive-consuming user of items to an active citizen, with

characteristics such as critical thinking and awareness, and this behavior will rebounds on

the society[7]

and the whole function of the world. Even the smallest change to a seemingly

unrelated thing or condition, can affect small or large complex systems in distant places[15]

.

That is the message of this paper. We are all part of systems, small, local, big, specific,

general, that somehow they are linked and they interact each other[1]

. If we think that way,

we might realize how powerful we can be. Even the smallest action or decision can make the

difference. The important and difficult part is to find to what direction, this act and decision,

must go. And that is the designers’ responsibility and task, through their design act to lead

the user and finally to encourage him to break free from this modern “medieval” period and

to succeed his individual but the same time, as part of the system, the world’s “renaissance”.

To wrap up, we must find a new theoretical frame for the design practice that, somehow, it

will encourage designers to leave the formal logic and the natural sciences and turn to the

humanities and the social sciences (Svanaes 2011). In this point I would like to introduce my

ingredients for this reDesigning-Design recipe. We have three things, IxD, DA and the need

for a better society. Let’s isolate some important elements, and describe their combination.

Interaction Design

As Alan Cooper claims, what clearly marks interaction design is imagining things as they

might be, rather than focusing on how things are. Additionally, interaction design is heavily

focused on satisfying the needs and desires of the people who will use the product.

Moreover, Jonas Lowgren claims that interaction design is about shaping digital artifacts for

people’s use. But what if , instead of shaping digital items, we shape the public opinion and

consciousness [11]

. What if we link the notions of the “shape a digital item for the user ” with

the notion of “shape the society for the citizen”? So, the designer’s focus is how things in our

societies might be and start designing in that direction. After all, any design is composed of

concepts, materials, technics and strategies etc. as our societies are composed of humans,

relationships, emotions, social practices etc. The challenge is to have this components work

as a unique assembly with a unified purpose [1]

.

Design Activism

It is not meaningless to say that the DA is quite new term and context-wise, considered

somewhere in between of the art activism and political activism. If we want to start adding

the notion of the DA in this theory, we must first try to answer the research questions

defined by T.Marcussen, about why and how does DA matter and what is its impact on

people’s everyday life. But my approach will always implement the IxD field.

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So, to answer how, I want to make clear that sociology and political theory have

satisfactorily enough vocabulary to frame terms like “democracy”, “public space”,

“participation” etc, but they have no language to describe the design act itself. Protests,

strikes etc cannot be considered as design act (Marcussen 2011). Additionally, it is clear that

the Design Act has to do more with the designerly way of intervening into people’s life

(Thrope 2008). And here is the “empty” space, the opportunity, which the IxD is called to

make the difference, to fill that gap. In other words, IxD is more about the design act,

because it consists of a variety of design technics and methods, such as the respect of the

end-users’ needs, but also because it typifies the user as participant in a various forms

(Lowgren 2008), and elevates his urban space to a design place.

Moreover, to answer why DA matters, I want to use Thrope’s claim that activism occurs in

the decoding and reassembling processes [11]

. That fits with my point of view that the

creation of a new digital item or the development of an existing one, is not an end in itself.

The decoding and reassembling the process of –probably- an already well-functioned object,

with an overall goal to reshape people’s political behavior and social awareness, can be

another delimitation for what interaction designer designs; can add one completely different

but not contradictive perspective to what Jonas Lowgren connotes as the delimitation of an

interaction designer is to design digital things.

In that point I would like to raise the question, why does design activism actually matter?

We can claim that the central notion to understand the effect in our lives of design activism

is the notion of disruption. And as Marcussen, cited from Fuad-Luke (2009) “Forms of  

activism are also an attempt to disrupt existing paradigms of shared meaning, values and

purpose to replace them with new ones.” I imagine the routine of the daily life as a circle. In

other words, a stable situation with low entropy. DA must be an incident that will increasethe system’s entropy, and that means disorder, short of chaos, that will interrupt or disrupt

the calmness of this cycle. That particular moment, is probably the best time to

communicate your design. So, one shall see the basic notion of DA, the disruption, as one

designerly Trojan Horse that inside its belly, carries the message and the qualities of the

design concept that you have created. But it is also important to mention that, no matter

the design concept and its specific aims, the overall goal shall be to embrace new ways of

thinking about how design can catalyze, nurture, enable and activate positive societal

changes towards more sustainable ways of living and working.

Main Idea

The interesting and effective characteristic of the DA is that doesn’t use conventional ways

but unorthodox ones. Having this as a starting point, I wanted to test how this can be

implemented in the sense of interaction itself. Having said that, the traditional and the basic

goal of an interaction designer is to provide a better experience of the end user. In the

contrary, I want the overall interaction to be as loud as it can. Firstly, it will not focus on

creating better conditions for the user but exactly the opposite. Apparently, I am not saying

to provide a new low quality item or service that replaces the older good one. The key is to

reshape the existing procedures with others that increase the system’s entropy and create

short of chaos to the daily pattern, having as a multiple result, first, to capture the citizen’s 

attention and interest and eventually, to start a social dialogue[2]

 trying to define the new

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interaction conditions. That, kind of Disruptive Interaction Design informs and creates

behaviors and emotions, and that is a potential tool to steer and guide emerging social

practices.

Activity

To test a part of the previous theory, I went out to the public space. The idea was to mimic

the signs in some doors that prohibit the entrance for unauthorized persons. In that sense,

my sign will prohibit the use of the specific park bench and bus seat, pretended to be

privatized. The decision to use signs was that I wanted to show how easily one day, only with

a small sign, a public item can be out of the public sphere. The result wasn’t bad but wasn’t

perfect. It was something to starting thinking about how IxD and DA can be combined in a

more effective way. The first challenge was to succeed disruption. I observed that the

majority of the people noticed the new condition of the use of the bench. Also the majority

of those, after standing and thinking even talking about that for few seconds, decided to sit!

Some of them also hide the sign with their bag or something. In the contrary one person,

male Swedish, decided to follow the message of the sign and he went to the next bench. The

outcome is not clear enough though. You can say that the disruption worked well. Of course

there is plenty of space for development regarding the item and the process of its decoding

and reassembling. But I realized that regarding the second challenge, and that is the

transmission of the message, I didn’t have any clue. Obviously you will never be sure about

what is happening inside the people’s mind, but I think the whole process could have more

ways to provide me a feedback about the message itself. And that is the outcome for the

next step; to find a way to have inputs about the message and how this affects the

participants, if that is possible. I might have to implement some other elements, for instance

the pros of the participatory design and the cross media, and to try different techniques andapproaches, so I can develop this first attempt to use this Interaction Design Activism.

Conclusion

This project is an attempt to explore the sense of interaction design through the disruptive 

lens of design activism shifting the focus of designer’s attention; the digital item will be the

society and its individual elements, while the user-client will be the user-citizen. By doing so,

I want to create the potential theoretical base to democratize and dematerialize Design

process and make it accessible to all. From the designer perspective, it is very important to

highlight the importance of the individual. One individual, that in this new, unorthodox

design process, is the primary target group, putting his spiritual evolution and development

above the, proven to be inefficient, materialistic way to search for solution. Form the user-

citizen perspective, the values framed are that he ought to realize the power that he can

have to impact the world’s image. Furthermore, this power will be increased in a broad

social participation and collaboration, and subsequently, it will increase his resistance to the

Mass Media, the fast modern life, the Consuming and the Fear, which all are some of the

sleeping tools of the System that creates and deepens this global Crisis.

References

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1) Bertalanffy, L.von, (1969) General System Theory. New York: George Braziller

2) Bryden; Funk; Geard; Bullock; Jansen (2010) The Social Butterfly  

[Available at: www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDOqmjc-ZpY] 

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4) Confessions of an Economic Hit Man: from a story by John Perkins (2004 ). Documentary.

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Classics 

6) Marcussen, T. (2011) The Disruptive Aesthetics of Design Activism: Enacting Design

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7) Mollison, B. (1988). Permaculture: A Designers’  Manual . Tagari Publications (Australia)

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11) Thrope, A. (2008). Defining Design as Activism. Journal of Architectural Education

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from….] Greece

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15) Lorenz, E.N. Predictability: Does the Flap of a Butterfly’s Wing in Brazil Set Off a Tornado

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Cambridge, Massachusetts

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"Encyclopedia of Human-Computer Interaction". Aarhus, Denmark: The Interaction-

Design.org Foundation. Available online at http://www.interaction-

design.org/encyclopedia/interaction_design.html 

17) Cooper, A.; Reimann,R.; Cronin, D. (2007). About Face 3: The Essentials of Interaction

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