MANILA, PHILIPPINES — Sarah Ichioka, founder of Desire Lines and author of Flourish: Design Paradigms of Our Planetary Emergency, invited guests at the 7th International Design Conference to shift their thinking when it comes to their undertakings in saving the Earth. In her talk titled ‘Design’s Next Promise: Reframing Purpose and Reclaiming Power’, she challenged the audience to go deeper than surface-level fixes, and to push for regenerative solutions.
“Too many of the changes that we’ve made to date…have been what we might categorize as reform measures. They will slow the path to breakdown, but they will not get us off the path to breakdown,” she said.
She appealed to guests to consider transformative measures rather than reformative ones. For instance, instead of investing all efforts into developing emission-free cars, why not also give equal importance to cities that are pedestrian- and cyclist-friendly? While recycling is good for the oceans, why don’t not also work on restoring ecosystems and enforcing industrial water pollution control? People in authority create policies to attract investors and create more employment, but why not consider using design thinking to come up with measures that effectively redistribute wealth?
Watch Sarah Ichioka tackle these issues in her full talk at the 7th International Design Conference:
