Using the Schrödinger’s Box lens, we are now mostly populating the World with dead cats, and they are killing us slowly, while entrancing us with their phony, mysterious enigmatic Mona Lisa smiles. (This then we believe is wonderland). What we put out there in the name of progress and development, mostly, drastically shrinks probability spaces, Read more
Karnataka State in India is considering a Design Park along the lines of one in Dubai. Design is on everyone’s mind. Creative Economies are engines of growth, and the UK, as one example, has done a great job in making that real. Could parks such as these alone become engines for the creative economy, or, Read more
A conversation this morning, and this happened between long-time friends from the amateur theater world in Bangalore India, prompted this post. It occurred to me that rehearsals, which often lasted a couple of months or more, provided a direct experience in what it might mean in order to ‘make’ in a design studio for Read more
A colleague just returning from teaching creativity in a Corporate setting expressed the need for logic and philosophy in education as a prerequisite. He seemed somewhat frustrated by the experience. I have had similar experiences working with not just design students, but people in positions that need to make strategic decisions, and need to grapple with Read more
The Taliban have done horrible things in the past, when they had an opportunity to govern. The things that most stand out as signatures are their brutality, intolerance, misogyny, among other things. They came in to restore order, and in the midst of institutional failure, delivered on some basic promises of stability and order. Their Read more
When we think of Strategic Decision-Making in complex social situations, which I think of as synonymous with Strategic Design, we tend to see body of decision makers – people in positions of authority. In the case of civic services, the idea of decision makers, merges with the agencies providing the services. A post on social Read more
There is an urgent need to address complex societal challenges, and while each discipline makes valiant efforts to rise up to the task, they are bound to find themselves inadequate. The Complexities of Social Challenges cannot be understood at the level at which they were created, nor can they therefore also be solved by the Read more
Note:It has been a while since I have posted something here. I have used the time of the Covid Pause to further clarify my thinking. I just wanted to quickly put down some of my thoughts – mostly for my own sake. Will come back to edit and clean up. Realizing Better Futures – Read more
How does one understand and grapple with complex intractable issues such as poverty, inequality, environmental degradation, violence, etc. in order to create better and more enduring outcomes? These challenges cannot easily be traced to simple causes – and therefore are not amenable to superficial treatments. One needs to go beyond the current world of order, Read more
What does it mean to say, ’embrace complexity!’. This is something I have been pondering about for a while. It is the recognition of a new kind if order – something we did not have language for – we also know the grammar of that expression- sometimes it is in visible structures but more often Read more