{"id":26459,"date":"2010-05-26T14:34:48","date_gmt":"2010-05-26T14:34:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/design-for-the-first-world-about\/"},"modified":"2010-05-26T14:34:48","modified_gmt":"2010-05-26T14:34:48","slug":"design-for-the-first-world-about","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/design-for-the-first-world-about\/","title":{"rendered":"Design For the First World \u00bb About"},"content":{"rendered":"

Design For the First World \u00bb About<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

Dx1W began as a sar\u00adcas\u00adtic com\u00adment. The idea came to me in a class in which I was asked to cre\u00adate an object on \u201csocial design\u201d. The assign\u00adment was one week long and there was no spe\u00adcific con\u00adtext. Why would you assume that you can design some\u00adthing to solve a prob\u00adlem for the so called Third World \u2013a world you don\u2019t know\u2013 in a week? Well, because Bono has told us so. Didn\u2019t we all just change the world by going to the Live 8 con\u00adcerts? Hav\u00ading this assign\u00adment in class (in NYU) imme\u00addi\u00adately fired me up and raised my dis\u00adcom\u00adfort lev\u00adels with the attempts from First World agents to solve Third World Prob\u00adlems to nuclear fusion tem\u00adper\u00ada\u00adtures. I decided to do some\u00adthing about it and this is how this com\u00adpe\u00adti\u00adtion was born.<\/p>\n

To set things straight I am not ques\u00adtion\u00ading the need for aid or the good inten\u00adtions. What really dis\u00adturbs me are the pater\u00adnal\u00adis\u00adtic and mis\u00adin\u00adformed approaches that end up as a waste of resources and cause more harm than good in the long run. This approach to aid has been cri\u00adtiqued before<\/a>, there\u2019s even a term for this kind of design in acad\u00ade\u00admia: para\u00adchute design or remote design. What hap\u00adpens when some\u00adone does a para\u00adchute design is that the well and nicely designed objects aimed to \u201cimprove\u201d aspects of a com\u00admu\u00adni\u00adties are over\u00adlook\u00ading the real prob\u00adlems and the con\u00adtext of that com\u00admu\u00adnity, and hence, if lucky, they end up as part of the fur\u00adni\u00adture or as chil\u00addren toys (if they are durable). As a side effect the designer is mocked in that com\u00admu\u00adnity for years to come and will be dubbed \u201cEl gringo\u201d from then on, pass\u00ading that name on to any other white guy that set foot in that vil\u00adlage. Oh we\u2019re such a bunch of smart asses in the devel\u00adop\u00ading world.<\/p>\n

There are of course (and gladly) plenty of suc\u00adcess\u00adful attempts to help the devel\u00adop\u00ading world. So why am I focus\u00ading on the bad? Because there\u2019s more of the Bono and Bob Gel\u00addorf and Brangelina type of aid out there than of the use\u00adful ones. Yes, its great to have celebri\u00adties involved to raise aware\u00adness but where does all that money go? I don\u2019t see much change here, instead I see how the devel\u00adop\u00ading goals (you know, the \u201cmake poverty his\u00adtory\u201d, have clean water, basic edu\u00adca\u00adtion) keep being pushed fur\u00adther into the future.<\/p>\n

But there\u2019s some\u00adthing else. Design for the First World shouldn\u2019t be funny. The phrase \u201cThird World minds design\u00ading for First World Prob\u00adlems\u201d pro\u00advokes smiles in many includ\u00ading myself. But why is it funny? Why do we assume that Third World minds shouldn\u2019t be involved in the prob\u00adlems of the First World? In all hon\u00adesty and bold\u00adness I think we (the Third World) have grown accus\u00adtomed to the top help\u00ading the bot\u00adtom and because of that we\u2019ve grown lazy. We don\u2019t even think things can be both ways. We can help them! I believe there is a need to re-educate our\u00adselves as devel\u00adop\u00ading coun\u00adtries and gain agency. Let\u2019s clean the mess in our rooms after we play; our rooms being the whole world.<\/p>\n

Fur\u00adther\u00admore, the prob\u00adlems the First World is hav\u00ading are and should be our con\u00adcern as well, after all that is where we are head\u00ading. We\u2019ve cre\u00adated a cul\u00adture that relies on aid and we (and them) often dis\u00adcard our respon\u00adsi\u00adbil\u00adity in improv\u00ading our present con\u00addi\u00adtions and shap\u00ading a bet\u00adter future. True, there\u2019s a lot on our plate (prob\u00adlems, that is), but there are enough inspir\u00ading indi\u00advid\u00adu\u00adals in our com\u00admu\u00adni\u00adties that have stood up and made a dif\u00adfer\u00adence. It\u2019s time to fol\u00adlow their exam\u00adple and wake up (per\u00adhaps in reverse order). Not only are we capa\u00adble of pro\u00advid\u00ading sig\u00adnif\u00adi\u00adcant con\u00adtri\u00adbu\u00adtions to cre\u00adate a bet\u00adter and more sus\u00adtain\u00adable soci\u00adety in both the devel\u00adoped and the devel\u00adop\u00ading worlds, it is our respon\u00adsi\u00adbil\u00adity as inhab\u00adi\u00adtants of this planet.<\/p>\n

Please get in touch<\/a> if you wanna dis\u00adcuss any\u00adthing regard\u00ading the com\u00adpe\u00adti\u00adtion or this topics.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Design For the First World \u00bb About Dx1W began as a sar\u00adcas\u00adtic com\u00adment. The idea came to me in a class in which I was asked to cre\u00adate an object on \u201csocial design\u201d. The assign\u00adment was one week long and there was no spe\u00adcific con\u00adtext. Why would you assume that you can design some\u00adthing to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"link","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[10],"tags":[335,493,187,42,1278],"class_list":["post-26459","post","type-post","status-publish","format-link","hentry","category-words","tag-critical-engagement","tag-critical-practice","tag-critique","tag-design","tag-design-for-the-first-world","post_format-post-format-link"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6PWot-6SL","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26459","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26459"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26459\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26459"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26459"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26459"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}