From empowerment to emancipation : an exploration of design citizenship through design activism in South Africa

Abstract

Owing to the ubiquity of design in contemporary culture, there is a!proliferation!of!new!roles!for! design!especially!within!the!context!of!design!for!the!common!good;!one!such!example!includes! design!activism,!which!aims!to!instil!and!enable social,!environmental!and!political!agency!among! citizens.!However,!unlike!design!activism,!design!citizenship!is!a!new!concept!that!lacks!a!concrete! theoretical!framework.!Accordingly,!this!thesis!uses!a!constructivist!grounded!theory!methodology! to!present!a!substantive!theory!of!design!citizenship by!exploring!the!relationship!between!design! activism!and!citizenship in!South!Africa.!For!data!generation!purposes,!the!fieldwork!comprised!an! analysis!of!design!interventions!that!addressed!pertinent!social!issues!faced!by!citizens!in!two!cities,! namely Pretoria!and!Cape!Town.!To!this!end,!openHended!interviews!were!held!with!the!research! participants,!who!included!participants,!facilitators!and!sponsors!(corporate!and!nonHcorporate)!of!a! sample!of!design!interventions.!The!empirical!evidence!generated!through!the!grounded!theory! process!points!towards!a!YHshaped!model!of!design!citizenship!that!situates!the!social!phenomenon! of!design!citizenship!at!the!intersection!of!design!activism!and!critical!citizenship,!and!thereby! suggests!the!causal!relationship between!the!two.!The!model!comprises!three!overarching! processes, namely awakening awareness, igniting agency and sustaining a design thinking impetus. The disruptive and transformative!nature!of!design!citizenship,!facilitated!by!these!three!processes! over a sustained!period!of!time, suggests that design provides!common!ground for citizens which in turn affords them with an opportunity to move from being merely empowered to being emancipated