Design, power and colonisation : decolonial and antioppressive explorations on three approaches for Designfor Sustainability

Abstract

Our contemporary world is organized in a modern/colonial structure. As people,professions and practices engage in cross-country Design for Sustainability (DfS), projectshave the potential of sustaining or changing modern/colonial power structures. In suchproject relations, good intentions in working for sustainability do not directly result inliberation from modern/colonial power structures. In this paper we introduce threeapproaches in DfS that deal with power relations. Using a Freirean (1970) decolonialperspective, we analyse these approaches to see how they can inform DfS towards beingdecolonial and anti-oppressive. We conclude that steering DfS to become decolonial orcolonizing is a relational issue based on the interplay between the designers’ position inthe modern/colonial structure, the design approach chosen, the place and the peopleinvolved in DfS. Hence, a continuous critical reflexive practice is needed in order to preventDfS from becoming yet another colonial tool