On the Politics of Design Framing Practices

Abstract

In this conceptual article, our aim is to deconstruct the conceptualization of design framing and establish its essentially political nature. It demonstrates the positionality inherent within frames insofar as frames articulate subordinated or dominant status, or express normative understandings until challenged. In doing so, we build a conceptualization of the political foundations of design framing practices and their implications for those contexts within which design operates. Consequently, we argue for dissensual counter-framing design practices that unsettle institutionalized norms and ideologies played out within frames, and through which a form of political agency is sociomaterially enacted.

Design for Social Advocacy: Some Experiences from Taiwan

“…Fuad-Luke (2009) said, "We need [aesthetics] that encourages new ideas, values, and new ideals of true human prosperity, to transcend the narrow idea regarding economic growth as progress." Moreover, designers have been described as "material-semiotic storytellers" whose material practices normalize past and present values into the future (Prendeville, Syperek & Santamaria, 2022). Designers can serve as agents of resistance by transforming themselves from "cultural intermediaries" who create symbolic meanings (Bourdieu, 1984) to design activists who utilize culture to embody their visions for a better world.…”

‘Design for policy’ from below: grassroots framing and political negotiation

“…In addition, notes how purposeful reframing shifts the mainstream frame allowing a new perspective. Nevertheless, whilst Dorst (2011) noted that dealing with complex problems has advanced practices within the design disciplines, such as frame creation, through which a problematic situation can be tackled from an original standpoint, others have explained how these concepts of complexity and framing have masked the political at work in design framing (Rein and Sch€ on 2013;Van der Bijl-Brouwer 2019;Lee 2020;Prendeville, Syperek, and Santamaria 2022).…”

“…To this end, recently, design scholars have rearticulated frames as social phenomena (Agid, 2012;Keshavarz and Maze 2013;Prendeville, Syperek, and Santamaria 2022), taking positions on issues bound by discourses and subjectivities within a context, and intimately related to ideology. This emphasizes how claims to knowledge, belief systems and values involve various standpoints (Benford and Snow 2000;Chong and Druckman 2007).…”

“…When values, beliefs, goals, and ideology are congruent and complementary, frame alignment becomes possible-in turn, misalignment implies failure (Benford and Snow 2000). Taking design frames as material practices that are inherently political (Prendeville and Syperek 2021;Prendeville, Syperek, and Santamaria 2022) allows for problematizing reductive understandings of frame failure. Chong and Druckman (2013) argue alternative frames influence issues' structuring and evaluation.…”

“…climate denial messaging) (Dunlap and McCright 2011). Following Prendeville, Syperek, and Santamaria (2022), frames and counterframes involve contextual and historically contingent socio-material processes and practices. Counter-frames are responses to established frames and contest existing understandings of society expressed through common public discourses and political debates.…”