Five enunciations of empowerment in participatory design
Abstract
Participatory design has been defined as having 'user's democratic participation and empowerment at its core' (Correia and Yusop, 2008). The PD discourse has a strong moral and rhetorical claim by its emphasis on users' empowerment. This paper is a result of a student project, guided by a curiosity about how empowerment is enunciated in the PD field today. In a literature-review of academic papers from the proceedings of PDC 2008 we found that empowerment is enunciated in five different ways which can be translated into 5 categories: 1) Specific user groups 2) Direct democracy 3) The users' position 4) Researchers' practice 5) Reflexive practice. These categories exist conjointly in the literature and suggest that empowerment is not just a moral and politically correct design goal, but a challenged and complex activity.
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There is no shared definition of what participatory design (PD) is.
“This confusion stems from no shared definition of what PD is.”
From An introduction to radical participatory design: decolonising participatory design processes (2022) · cites this paper as Ertner, Kragelund & Malmborg 2010
Researchers and designers use the term PD to signify different understandings of power and empowerment, different levels of politics in the design process, different groups of people, different methods, different goals of participation, and different amounts and configurations of participation.
“Researchers and designers use the term PD to signify different understandings of power and empowerment, different levels of politics in the design process, different groups of people, different methods, different goals of participation, and different amounts and configurations of participation”
From An introduction to radical participatory design: decolonising participatory design processes (2022) · cites this paper as Ertner, Kragelund & Malmborg 2010
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References 7 · Cited by 67
- Authors
- Ertner, M., Kragelund, A. M., & Malmborg, L.
- Affiliations
- IT University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen
- IT University of Copenhagen (DK)
- ORCID
- Malmborg, Lone
- Venue
- Proceedings of the 11th Biennial Participatory Design Conference
- Publisher
- ACM
- Published
- 2010-11-29
- Pages
- 191-194
- OpenAlex
- W2069121726
- Cited by
- 67
- References
- 7
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 5 · 2024: 8 · 2023: 5 · 2022: 9 · 2021: 7 · 2020: 5 · 2019: 4 · 2018: 5 · 2017: 3 · 2016: 4 · 2015: 1 · 2014: 3 · 2013: 1 · 2012: 4
- FWCI
- 1.22
- Type
- conference paper
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Participatory Design Conference (publishedVersion)
- IT University Of Copenhagen (IT University of Copenhagen) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Human-Computer Interaction › Innovative Human-Technology Interaction
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Human-Computer Interaction › Usability and User Interface Design
- Social Sciences › Business, Management and Accounting › Management of Technology and Innovation › Innovative Approaches in Technology and Social Development
- Keywords
- empowerment, participatory design, user participation, democratic participation, direct democracy, reflexive practice, user position
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