Participation
I haven’t taken time to reflect much on the results of my last semester of grad school. My work seemed to fall into two distinct areas: situated technology systems and how designers learn. My thesis project (Pickster) and Draudibubble both fell into the technology systems category as they focused on technology’s impact on interaction within a specific location. My thesis essay and my final paper for our independent study with Hugh Dubberly focused on what is different about the design process and how design is taught.
It was with much surprise this morning that I connected these two areas via a single topic: participation. All of these projects focus on why someone would participate in something, how that participation can occur, and what will result from participating. In each instance, the desired result is the creation of a thing larger than any of the individuals who contributed. I am interested in the design of social systems focused on working toward a shared outcome. Shared experience is an important part as well, but it’s not just the experiencing, it’s the doing that I find fascinating about systems involving multiple participants.
This is all a roundabout answer to Jeff’s question. Yes, an election result is a design. An election result is the outcome of a system with the goal of expressing the intent and ideas of a body of people, an organization. The hope is that the election results will change an existing situation into a preferred situation. Our election system is not perfect, far from it, but it allows for participation in government on a massive scale. That participation has intent with regard to a future state, and as such is an act of design. The outcome of the election is ultimately a design resultant from the system that we use for designing our government: the election process.