From “The politics in design and the design of politics” — Our practices and systems often privilege educated, literate extroverts, even when we call for marginalised people to participate in design processes. Around me there’s growing awareness of, and emphasis on, power-sensitive practice in social design, but we keep coming up against cultural and structural barriers. …

Emma Blomkamp with Anna Brown [1] As Australia rode the first wave of the pandemic in April 2020, Prime Minister Scott Morrison dangled the new COVIDSafe app as a carrot to coax the public out of lockdown safely. …

Ngā mihi o te tau hou, happy new year! I can’t compete with Margaret and David’s review of 2020, or The Guardian readers who summed it up in one word (shit), but I have a few reflections to offer on what I noticed in looking back on the past 12…

An ominous orange haze was clouding out the sun when I woke on the first of January in the South Island of New Zealand. Returning to Melbourne a few days later, my partner and I picked up face masks to protect ourselves from the toxic smoke invading the city, as…

One of the things I really loved about the Innovating Systems Thinking event held in Melbourne this month was how it shone light on the humans at the centre of this work. …

It’s pretty uncool to be interested in government, right? It’s easy to hate a lot of political leaders right now. Even talking about politics on social media is something I’ve been told to avoid. Not because it will get me into trouble. …

There’s lots of interest in co-design at the moment, coming from all sorts of different places. …

There has never been a better time, full of opportunity for social innovation work, as right now in New Zealand. When leading social innovators from Aotearoa New Zealand (Gael Surgenor) and Australia (Ingrid Burkett) say this, it’s hard not to feel excited. When you get to spend two days with…

There has been a plethora of claims in recent years about what co-design can do and why we should be using it, especially in the public sector. Co-design, we are told, can help us to generate more innovative ideas, ensure policies and services match the needs of citizens, achieve economic…