The Politics of the Artificial, Chapter Thirteen

What I read

In this text, Margolin describes the history of how design has been talked about and framed. He identifies that some have framed design as a science, and have lost out on the ability to think pluralistically about design. He considers how PhD programs may evolve to take on a new approach, and identifies that approach by four characteristics.

First, Margolin describes a split between people who think of design as a discipline, as compared to those who think of it as a way to span across humanities; he describes another split, between those who view design as something focused on practitioner-related ends (such as in manufacturing) as compared to something speculative. There is a lack of consensus across the field; Margolin proposes that “design studies” is a way of thinking about all of the different perspectives on design.

Then, Margolin discusses the history of design methods as a way of formalizing design. He references a particular moment at a conference where advocates for design methods as a flexible and phenomenological activity were positioned across from those who viewed them as a way of measuring design. While this led to some proponents of design rejecting the methods movement, it also led to further formalization of methods by researchers like Bruce Archer; Archer identifies ten categories of pure knowledge related to design. This firmly positioned design as a science. Archer’s perspectives are not in common practice today, but the way of thinking about design as science remains.

Margolin compares methods to a focus on project-oriented research, where project-oriented research is less abstract and more tangible for practitioners. This includes others in the process, such as engineers, as consumer products require design to be integrated into a larger product development process in order to create something of quality. Margolin notes that most of this product development process has been framed in terms of engineering. While this isn’t entirely what is meant by design as a study or discipline, it “provides an example of how theory, research, and practice can be integrated in a design situation.” Another example is provided—environmental design—but is framed as a discipline that hasn’t integrated, and where frustration exists between the various actors responsible in a project.

Margolin describes that ethnography is growing in popularity in product design, and this may be another opportunity for a more integrated form of design.

Next, Margolin indicates that the lens of design can be opened more to include the culture in which design occurs (removing it from a single project or process.) This requires designers to know about and think about multiple disciplines that aren’t operationally involved in producing a product through a project, but that impact all aspects of the design in a more broad sense; these include things like history and sociology. This pushes design away from just an applied process and into the realm of scholarly research; Margolin proposes four topics of study to approach this way of thinking. These include a focus on design practice, design products, design discourse, and metadiscourse—looking inward at design studies. Each topic is described, along with example texts that might be considered and examined in a scholarly way. Margolin proposes that this research is not contained in a single academic department, but instead, a doctorate in design studies could fit across departments. The knowledge generated by this interdisciplinarity of a high-level degree would “gradually make its way into design classrooms, studios, publications, and exhibitions.”

Margolin ends by describing a sense of urgency for this change, one focused on pluralism and avoids the overly structured, prescriptive nature of design methods.

What I learned and what I think

I’m reflecting on the way software product development has emerged since Margolin wrote this. The context of the process is completely different. We’re at short attention span theater, speed at all costs, OEM-style Figma drag and drop, and LinkedIn top-5 articles, and none of that leaves room for a “pluralistic” perspective on design. I don’t think practitioners have the time (or for some, the interest, and maybe not even the capacity to think about) to worry about the way design in practices transcends boundaries in a broad way. Ethics and accessibility seem to be the start and end of this extension away from methods, and those have also been “scienced” into a set of steps or checklists.

I’m also not sure how much it matters. I’m increasingly thinking that “UX” is not design, it’s something else, and it can be methodized and operationalized and then AI-ized, and then it will largely disappear. It will actually become exactly what Herb Simon envisioned: something to understandable that a computer can do it for us. I think it’s basically there: AI can produce pretty lame, incomplete solutions to design problems, and those are sufficient for most companies. The “UX people” can use their personas and scenarios and methods to manage that craziness, and design can go be some other thing.

What’s the other thing? The little vignettes and ideas that pop up and show bespokeness, or craft, or the ability to break out of enterprise software, and that we all share and love and are jealous of? Those transcend method and require a pluralistic view of the world, at least back into art and often into discursive commentary. Those don’t make a lot of money, though. That’s a split I’ve never really thought of; you can go make a lot of money doing UX, or you can go make not a lot of money doing design. Gross.This was a tiny return to design theory and I’m already sick of it. I need to look at something else. I’m going to try to find meaningful work on how creativity is taught and learned at an adult level. No idea if this body of work exists at all.