Designing With or Against Institutions? Dilemmas of Participatory Design in Contested Cities

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article explores growing concerns behind the potential instrumentalization of participatory design within democratic institutions and city-making projects. Drawing on ethnographic data collected during a participatory urban redevelopment in Sydney, it analyzes the wider political, economic, and cultural dynamics shaping participatory design (PD) in contested urban spaces. As a result, the article reflects on the institutional frameworks that challenged the democratic claims of PD, analyzing three interdependent levels of institutional constraints: ideology, governance, and narratives. In doing so, the article interrogates the role of expert-led urban governance, of neoliberal ideologies, and the power/knowledge relations in the building of a consensus narrative. Finally, the article concludes by highlighting the contingency of the so-called constraints, exploring an alternative conceptualization of institutions as social relations. Following this approach, designers may challenge constraints and simultaneously work with, against, and beyond institutions.