More-than-Human Governance and Policy Design

 

Hosted by Workroom, Aalborg University, Aalborg Kommune, Leidal & UHasselt and PXL MAD in Hasselt

Date: 25th October 2027 

Track Leads: Joachim Declerck, Lene De Vrieze (Workroom), Maurizio Teli & Tom Holmgaard Borsen (Aalborg University), Liesbeth Huybrechts, Weronika Kozak (UHasselt).  

 

 

About this track:

 

Within the project ReWorlding, a group of designers, artists and social scientists from various universities and policy institutions based in different countries (see overview https://reworlding.eu/thenetwork), work towards rethinking and shaping current policymaking practices and institutional frameworks in times of ecological and social crises. 

 

Policy institutions routinely declare ambitious targets about transitioning to a circular economy, to increased resilience in facing floods and drought, to a fossil-free future, to an affordable housing stock, and so on. All of these transitions require a fundamental transformation of streets, neighbourhoods, cities and landscapes.

 

Each of these transitions is a wicked problem: they are complex and interconnected. The overly anthropocentric view and lack of recognition of these interrelations – both human and non-human – often undermine the effectiveness of these policies. It is not so much that policymakers are unaware – pretty much every recent policy document advocates for an integrated or systemic approach – but they often lack the tools to incorporate situated, more-than-human realities into everyday governance. 

 

The contribution of design research to policymaking often mirrors this impasse oscillating between two approaches. On the one hand, we see a risk of distant speculative and utopian visions that are too disconnected from daily life or political realities for people to engage with, let alone be realised. On the other, we see narrow technical fixes or exceptional projects realised that lack replicable capacity and that leave underlying systems untouched. This disconnect can undermine the transformative potential of design research to support policies in becoming more integrating and effective to realise more sustainable worlds.  

 

Recent research has tried to overcome this disconnect through a shift in perspective - sometimes referred to as “more-than-human design”, sometimes “institutioning” - challenging institutions to not only engage humans in democratic decision-making regarding the future of our environment, but to also acknowledge non-human relationships they are entangled in, as well as re-think transitions through, for instance, sustainable economic models (cooperatives) or redefining water governance.  

 

What are we interested in?

 

In this track, we are looking for contributions that explore this general question: How can designers and design researchers co-shape with people and institutions the societal, organisational and spatial capabilities and infrastructures that would enable policies and governance to engage both humans and non-humans towards more sustainable worlds? 

 

We are interested in contributions that discuss the multiple aspects of the question above, from methods and techniques, to conceptual refinements and novelties that allow to account for the multidimensional relations between institutions, researchers/designers, and collectives of humans and non-humans inhabiting the world. 

 

Contributions that can connect the micro-practices of designing and researching design to collective, structural, and ecological phenomena, are particularly welcome. In those contributions, the processes of making and unmaking the relations collectives-designers-institutions become the focus of reflections.

 

We are also intrigued by forms of follow-up, or reflective assessment, of the enacted practices. Have there been opportunities that could be leveraged and instead ran out of sight? How emerging obstacles in past projects can be integrated in planning new initiatives?

 

In order to start the conversation, we launch a call for relevant practices for more-than-human policy and governance that will address the question posed above and correspond to the following themes/questions:

 

Conversation Theme 1. Redesigning Policy Institutions.

How can design challenge, shift or create alternatives to current policy institutions to better engage with and for collectives made up of different actors (e.g. more-than-human entities, such as water or energy; or grassroots movements) within the needed transitions?

 

Conversation Theme 2. Redesigning Policy Infrastructures.

How can design shift the ways institutions are embodied, lived and spatially organised to better facilitate actively engaging with different collectives including ecological or community actors?

 

Conversation Theme 3. Redesigning Policy in Dialogue.

How does using art and design methods and tools shift the ways in which collective initiatives and non-human actors enter into dialogue with institutions and the other way around? 

 

Based on the submission we will enter into debate with municipal, regional, and EU policy makers, as well as design and policy experts.