Social Imagination

Every situation contains more than its current design reveals.

More social possibility — the relations already present, the human goals operating beneath the task, the moments of connection or acknowledgment or care that technology is already in the middle of and has not yet noticed.

Finding this surplus, making it specific, making it inhabitable — this is what I mean by social imagination.

It is not a creative exercise. It is close, patient attention to what is already there. The work of staying in a situation long enough that the obvious falls away and something else becomes visible.

I have been practicing this for twenty years, across mobility, healthcare, public space, and AI. The same question, in different registers: what is already here that design has not found?

The connected world is full of unrealized possibility. Not because the technology is limited — because the imagination hasn't asked it yet.

Social imagination asks.

Social imagination offers a disruptive perspective, a new organization of meaning, revealing new possibilities, roles, and relations through which products or systems can actively participate in shared human experience.

We apply imagination as strategic, transformative energy to reframe design situations toward the human dimension, seeking meaning in the new context of needs, values, and relations.
We are in a moment when we need to continue learning new things and new ways how to put this world back together, in equitable and resilient ways.

Learning by imagining that things could be different when we re-prioritize human values and intentions embedded in objects, technology, material and social context.We need a concept that not only addresses the physical and embodied characteristics of the tangible but also could capture social properties, ethics, aesthetics, and cultural traits. 

Social imagination is the most advanced design method we have to start putting this world back together in equitable and resilient ways.