Systems thinking

A design decision that considers the impact on an entire network of affected systems, rather than a specific part, is known as systems thinking. Systems are bounded, can be nested, overlap with other systems, are autonomous in operation, parts can be distributed or co-located, can interact with the larger environment, and tend to be invisible.

Design can happen at every scale. At the small scale, humans can collide single atoms together to investigate theoretical physics or to create very large bombs. At the large scale, complex social and technological systems can impact the global climate affecting every living organism on Earth. Understanding the scale you are designing for will have many implications for your process and design outcomes. Systems thinking plays an essential role when designing for large scale, as there are many forces that will affect your design that are out of your control.

If you consider that an expert in any given field is an expert on the system or systems situated in that field, then people who work across systems from different fields can be considered to be transdisciplinary. A transdisciplinarian is a multi-systems worker and takes liberty to follow the networked paths for more holistic perspectives on problems and issues.

Cradle to Cradle

When thinking about a model to aid sustainable design, the term Cradle to Cradle Design was coined by German chemist Michael Braungart and U.S. architect William McDonough in their book, Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things. Cradle to Cradle Design accounts for wellness, social, economic, and ecological systems in the design model when producing consumer products, infrastructure, and services. The Cradle to Cradle Design model is a shift in perspective on the traditional product lifecycle – known as Cradle to Grave, a model where products eventually cease to be useful – and instead imagine how products can be made of biological or technical "nutrients" that are reused over and over. As a proof of concept, their 2002 book was printed on special synthetic paper, intended to be an example of a technical nutrient.

This book is not a tree.
It is printed on synthetic "paper" and bound into a book format developed by innovative book packager Charles Melcher of Melcher Media. Unlike the paper which we are familiar, it does not use any wood pulp or cotton fiber but is made from plastic resins and inorganic fillers. This material is not only waterproof, extremely durable, and (in many localities) recyclable by conventional means; it is also a prototype for the book as a "technical nutrient," that is, as a product that can be broken down and circulated infinitely in industrial cycles–made and re-made as "paper" or other products.[1]

The "S" word

The Designers Accord was a five-year project that culminated in the development of guiding principles and methodologies for integrating sustainability into design and teaching. This was done through design community engagement, networking, and by inspiring designers to share case studies, best practices, and ideas at hosted events. The guiding methodology numbered items:

1. Publicly declare participation in the Designers Accord.
2. Initiate a dialogue about environmental and social impact and sustainable alternatives with each and every client. Rework client contracts to favor environmentally and socially responsible design and work processes. Provide strategic and material alternatives for sustainable design.
3. Undertake a program to educate your teams about sustainability and sustainable design.
4. Consider your ethical footprint. Understand the impact of your firm, and work to measure, manage, and reduce it on an annual basis.
5. Advance the understanding of environmental and social issues from a design perspective by actively contributing to the communal knowledge base for sustainable design.

The “S” word

Talking about sustainable design is not the best way to talk about it.

Focus on leadership skills, participation, transparency, engagement, networks, human centered design, respect, and active listening. Ask students to rethink current paradigms and to envision a better future. [1]

The educational toolkit also recommends that you do not use the word sustainability when incorporating it into a curriculum, and I have followed this recommendation for the most part within course projects and other assignments. Sustainability is a central part to all good design, though it's not specifically referenced. The Designers Accord is a clear example of an organized initiative to get designers thinking more systemically in terms of environmental and social impact.

The problem of the ‘hyperobject’

Now, let us consider the issue of large congregations of plastic in the sea, described on the website for the United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA):

How Big Is the "Great Pacific Garbage Patch"? Science vs. Myth (External Website)

Essentially, there is a ton of discarded waste plastic that has found its way into the Pacific Ocean, and it is negatively impacting wildlife. Let's explore this issue through a bit of speculation. Where did the plastic come from, how did it find its way to the sea, and who might have been involved in this process? To answer these questions, we would have to imagine the shape and scope of the networked system. No actual research was performed for this speculation, but the proposed ideas are reasonable enough for the purposes of this example. In a real study, citations would certainly be required:

1. Industrial producers: Material design, Engineering Design
   • Availability of cheap crude-oil makes plastic easy and cheap to produce
2. Business and economics: Business and Product Design
   • Financial markets trade heavily in crude oil (from which plastic is made)
   • Availability of cheap plastic materials and mass production technology
   • Business goals and values do not align with minimizing impact to existing ecological system
3. Public consensus: Public Relations and Marketing design
   • Ad campaigns infiltrate popular culture
   • Wastefulness is widely accepted and normalized
   • Marketing campaigns are effective at selling products
4. Waste management processes: Service Design
   • Wastefulness is good for business
   • No real long-term ecological considerations for disposal
5. Government: Policy Design
   • Special interest lobbying prevents ecological policies from hindering the sale of products
   • Issue not prioritized by society
   • Recycling initiatives are not timely and universally ineffective

Supposing this list was accurate, the next step would to be to better understand the systems in which each participant was embedded so that we may clarify underlying systemic issues. Being able to comprehend and perceive an entire interconnected network is admittedly not easy. This idea becomes more apparent when considering the amount of people who disagree on the cause and effect responsible for the breakdown of a system. Modern examples of system breakdown include the 2008 global recession, man-made climate change, and the British exit of the European Union.

Critic Timothy Morton calls these systems hyperobjects. They are objects so large and complex, that humans can not perceive them in their entirety.

"The problem is bigger, it’s a system.” Curtis and I briefly discussed a word coined by the critic Timothy Morton to describe a problem so vast in space and time that you are unable to apprehend it: a “hyperobject.” Global warming is a classic example of a hyperobject: it’s everywhere and nowhere, too encompassing to think about. Global markets, too. But naming a hyperobject alone is of limited use; human cognition knows all too well how to file such imminent imponderables away, on a “to-do” list that’s never consulted again. [3]

‘Wicked’ problems

To adequately describe the difficulty of designing policies to fix complex social issues, UC Berkeley professors Horst Rittel and Melvin M. Webber formalized theory in a 1973 publication around the term “wicked problem.” It describes problems that are not only difficult to define, but also inherently unsolvable. They defined the following 10 characteristics of wicked problems:

1. A wicked problem has no particular form. (I.e. Poverty in one country is different from poverty in another, etc.)
2. Wicked problems can be worked on indefinitely. (Until resourced run out)
3. Subjectively good or bad rather than objectively true or false.
4. No means to immediately and fully test solutions.
5. Implementing solutions changes the problem, and are therefore “one-shot” operations rather than trial and error.
6. No criteria to indicate if all solutions have been identified.
7. Every wicked problem is unique. (Problem solving process is always new)
8. Wicked problems are symptoms of other problems. (Interconnected complex systems)
9. How the problem is framed dictates how the problem is solved. (Bias heavily influences approach)
10. Planners are responsible for negative outcomes that result from the actions they take. (The stakes are high)

[4]

This list might sound daunting, but don't despair – these are not necessarily unsolvable problems. Designers have been developing ways to attack the wicked problem for many years. These problems are where design thinkers and interdisciplinarian workers situate themselves. For some inspiration, see IDEO's open design community platform: https://www.openideo.com/

Citation

1. McDonough, William; Braungart, Michael (2002). Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things. North Point Press. p. 193. ISBN 0-86547-587-3. Retrieved 28 December 2016.
2. The Designers Accord: Integrating sustainability into design education: The Toolkit. (2009) Retrieved 28 December 2016.
3. Lethem, Jonathan. Adam Curtis and the Secret History of Everything. The New York Times Magazine. October 27, 2016. Retrieved 28 December 2016.
4. Rittel, Horst. "Dilemmas in a General Theory of Planning." Policy Sciences, 1973: 155-169.