Towards a Power-Balanced Participatory Design Process

Abstract

Participatory designers have taken inspiration from other practices like the social sciences to develop socially just and horizontal processes to collaborate with communities. In the current work, we take the premise that designers do not have enough means to address concepts of power and politics in design practice. Therefore, we elaborate upon how designers could develop horizontal
relationships within participatory design practices. Informed by the legacy of Paulo Freire, a research-through-design study exploring new ways of engaging and interacting with the community has been conducted. The study setup allowed for reflection upon the changing role of the designer in a community context. We conclude with a series of propositions and discuss their contribution to power-balanced relationships in participatory design processes.