Historical Perspectives on the Interrelationship between Social Design and Critical Design

2022 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 20K12530
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Review Section: Basic Section 90010:Design-related
• Research Institution: Osaka University
• Principal Investigator: Takayasu Keisuke 大阪大学, 大学院人文学研究科(人文学専攻、芸術学専攻、日本学専攻), 教授 (70346659)
• Project Period (FY): 2020-04-01 – 2023-03-31
• Keywords: social design / critical design / speculative design / design history / problem-solving

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Non-commercial design involves two types: social design and critical design. While social design aims to solve the problems that people are facing today, critical design is known as an artistic experiment that asks what is really the problem, or suggests unexpected possibilities, suspending the solution of the immediate problem for a moment. Although both have been the subject of much interest, the history of each has not been well studied, and the relationship between the two has not been deeply questioned, despite that they are a pair of works. Based on historical data, this study compares the histories of those two lines of non-commercial design and examines the nature of problem-solving required of design.

Free Research Field

Design Studies

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

一方において、社会デザインへの高い関心があり、他方において、批判デザインやそれに類するアートが試みられてきたが、両者の関係を問う試みはほとんどなく、二つのカテゴリーは混同される場合もある。そこで、両者を区別して各々の歴史を描いて比較すれば、今日いわれる「問題解決」がいかに時代に条件づけられているか分かるようになる。たしかに、二つのいずれか区別できない事例もあるが、両者を区別するからこそ、両者の中間にあるような試みを評価できるようになる。本研究はそうした中間の試みを、思弁的（スペキュラティヴな）社会デザインと呼んで、見えにくい傾向を浮き彫りにする。