3 July 2018

Design Justice

From Sasha Costanza-Chock, Design Justice: towards an intersectional feminist framework for design theory and practice:

"Design is key to our collective liberation, but most design processes today reproduce inequalities structured by what Black feminist scholars call the matrix of domination. Intersecting inequalities are manifest at all levels of the design process. This paper builds upon the Design Justice Principles, developed by an emerging network of designers and community organizers, to propose a working definition of design justice: Design justice is a eld of theory and practice that is concerned with how the design of objects and systems influences the distribution of risks, harms, and benefits among various groups of people. Design justice focuses on the ways that design reproduces, is reproduced by, and/or challenges the matrix of domination (white supremacy, heteropatriarchy, capitalism, and settler colonialism). Design justice is also a growing social movement that aims to ensure a more equitable distribution of design's benefits and burdens; fair and meaningful participation in design decisions; and recognition of community based design traditions, knowledge, and practices."

This is a great start.

Update, March 2020: Sasha turned this into a book! Design Justice: Community-Led Practices to Build the Worlds We Need

Update, August 2020: The book is now online.