Strategies of design for social innovation and design activism in the promotion of positive social capital during the COVID-19 pandemic in Brazil.

This case study aimed at mapping initiatives of social innovation that have promoted positive social capital during the COVID-19 pandemic in Brazil. To this end, information about the actions and their developers were collected online and further described using the forms "Light Format" and "In-Depth Format", from the toolkit developed by the Design for Social Innovation and Sustainability (DESIS) Network. In addition, interviews with the people involved in the projects were carried out in order to obtain further details. From the promising cases mapped, 15 were selected and categorized according to their field, coverage area and target. Finally, the initiatives were assessed based on the concepts of design for social innovation (Manzini, 2008) and design activism (Fuad Luke, 2009; Thorpe, 2012). The analysis showed that whether the actions proposed had the design framework conceptions as a theoretical basis or not, the projects indeed adopted design strategies to reach their goals, leading to positive impact in the social, economic and environmental areas and thus promoted positive social capital.

Contemporary Design in Quarantine: a Critical Review of Design Responses to Covid-19 Crisis

The following article aims to analyze Brazilian and international cases of design responses to the COVID-19 pandemic related crises. It initiates with reflections about the social and political roles of design, emphasizing the importance of social innovation, design activism, and transition design to contemporary design. The methodological approach adopted is qualitative and quantitative with assessment and selection of data based on the bibliographic, desk, and documentary research methods. The result of 113 mapped cases is presented by graphic synthesis and discussed through the bibliographic research.

Design activism: catalysing communities of practice

Over the last decade, we have witnessed renewed interest in design as a socially engaged practice. Much of the debates around ‘social design’ point towards myriad approaches and disciplinary fields interwoven with grass-roots initiatives and social movements. Among these, design activism has gained traction as critical spatial practice that operates on the fringes of commercial and institutional spheres.The temporal, spatial and experimental nature of design activism is well delineated in scholarship but its long-term effect on everyday urban environments remains elusive. Moreover, the influence of design activism on socio-spatial dynamics is indeed largely under researched. By mobilising social practice theory, this paper proposes a novel theorisation of design activism that sheds light on the social formations and collective practices catalysed through the activist impulse. This ontological shift embraces an understanding of the socio-material world through practice. Such characterisation of design activism underscores collective moments of integration of the constitutive elements of practice, encapsulated by Shove, Pantzar and Watson as ‘material, competence and meaning’.The authors' own empirical research, funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) in the UK, reveals design activism as necessarily intertwined with other everyday practices – gardening, celebrating, playing – that coalesce around a shared sense of citizenship. It also advances the role of design activism in forging communities of practice: mutually supportive and self-sustaining groups emerging out of the personal relations sustained and organised around a practice of place making.