By Designdialogues, on January 9th, 2010% Part II. Human-Scale Tools for Change
While many authors recently warned of the consequences of an ideology of unfettered growth, including Ronald Wright, Jared Diamond, George Monbiot, and Thomas Homer-Dixon), philosopher/priest Ivan Illich warned us 40 years ago. He foresaw a collapse of the post-industrial economy, which did not happen then. Illich proposed that autonomous, . . . → Read More: Convivial Design for the American Breakdown
By Designdialogues, on January 4th, 2010% The new year often finds blogs and commentators concerned with the memes and themes of the oncoming era hurtling toward us. Participating as I do in the more “abstract” design communities (e.g., experience, anthro, service design, strategic innovation, interaction, information architecture) I observe a lot of unproductive self-definition. This takes the form of pronouncements about . . . → Read More: Who will we be when Design grows up?
By Designdialogues, on March 3rd, 2009% The full article is currently on Social Design, so first let me send readers to Joana’s stunning new design site. Here I’ll recap the central theme of Design Leadership for Problem Systems.
The design industry grew rapidly in the 20th century, by satisfying the massive and growing needs of consumer products, industrial systems, and a . . . → Read More: Design Leadership for Problem Systems
By Designdialogues, on January 31st, 2009% Today’s Globe & Mail reports on ChangeCamp.
What is ChangeCamp? It is the application of ‘the long tail’ to public policy. It is a long-held and false assumption that ordinary citizens don’t care about public policy. The statement isn’t, of itself, false. Many, many, many people truly don’t care that much. They want to live . . . → Read More: Toronto 2.0 – Becoming a wired participatory polity
By Designdialogues, on January 9th, 2009% In the BusinessWeek blog, Nussbaum on Design packs all the goodies gathered over the years from “innovation” and drops them into “transformation.” This pronouncement led to well over a dozen responses in the Transforming Transformation Google groups, some of them pages in length. Comparing these responses with the replies to the cheerleading or briefer critical . . . → Read More: Who Transforms in Transformation?
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Realizations by Peter Jones Whether from fear or habit, our culture is not innovating the democratic change sufficient to our time. We face an urgent challenge to make the differences that effect changes that so many seek.
Our cultural and social institutions have peaked out, but in their wiley senescence they have protected themselves from structural innovation. From healthcare to finance, politics to education, infrastructures & decision processes, we can & must reinvent social futures. Our societal systems have grown beyond their capacity to transform by management. Collaboration alone is insufficient - We truly need new cultures of co-innovation, collectively deciding, and socially organizing.
A community of practice meets for these dialogues in person every 2nd Wednesday in Toronto:

Art, science, and design are different ways of knowing. In the fields of action (business, community, and social co-creation) they regenerate each other. All ways of knowing are invited to the dance of change, if we are to interfere & reinvent our values and systems to open these possibilities. Your participation is required.
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