The design that connects : telling to educate

Our socio-economic system – powered by fossil energy, non-renewable and polluting, and based on the exponential growth of consumption, with consequent exponential growth of waste (planned obsolescence) – is now collapsing. So what can design do to improve the society in which we live? The thesis of this discussion is that design can do a lot. Of course, we do not refer here to the projecting of niche products, technologically advanced, hedonistic and for the lucky few. If we want to change things, the designers of the future will have to direct industrial production towards sustainable solutions: reducing, repairing, reusing, recycling. These ethical actions should not be entrusted to individual common sense but should be seen as prerequisites for (sustainable) design. In addition, designers will increasingly have to consider the use of renewable and clean forms of energy (such as Sun and wind). Above all, they should be concerned with sustainable processes, from project to consumption. Only in this way, retracing the history of the product (from the extraction of raw materials to what will be at the end of its life cycle), will it be possible to attribute its true value to it. Designers, then, should have as their first objective social innovation: to really improve people’s lives. But this cannot be possible if the sustainable products of the future do not take on meaning within new sustainable scenarios that must be wisely projected. And this is the critical point: the battle for sustainability can only be won by communicating sustainable scenarios, behaviors, relationships, services, products... within which people can recognize themselves by feeling a sense of gratification.