Corruption of Co-Design

Otto von Busch is Professor of Integrated Design at Parsons School of Design, The New School, New York.Karl Palmås is Associate Professor at Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg.

"Who knew critical design theory could be funny?"Lucy Kimbell, Professor, University of the Arts London, UK"This is an urgently needed book, providing Social Designers with political theories to correct the too-often naïve expansion of their material practice to social challenges. The Corruption of Co-Design manages to be a robust political argument that is nevertheless attentive to the experimental particularities of design practice. It marks a welcome step-change in what responsible co-designing entails."Cameron Tonkinwise, Professor, University of Technology Sydney, Australia"Machiavelli for democratic designers! A contradicto in adjecto? Not so for von Busch and Palmås. Realdesign, the healing cure they ordinate for the participative designer is bitter and it hurts, but it is most timely and helpful since codesign and design thinking today are fully integrated into neoliberal and public management agendas, reducing the 'good' designer to an (unconscious) hypocritical moralist. 'Good' maybe dead, but the suggested remedy for the participatory designer does not necessarily mean to give up co-created playful democratic utopian dreams, but rather to learn how to consciously take into account the rationality of power, to be able to seriously deal with betrayal, corruption, cunning and hypocrisy as we play along. The Corruption of Co-Design is a good place to start!"Pelle Ehn, Professor Emeritus, Sweden

• 1. Introduction: The Problems of Participatory Design 2. The Realist Challenge: Power and Possibilities 3. Betrayal: Post-political Participation 4. Corruption: Design and Decay 5. Cunning: Mêtis and Designerly Statecraft 6. Hypocrisy: of virtue and vice 7. Closing Propositions: After Empathy, Realdesign