From Needs to Desire: Pluriversal Design as a Desire-Based Design

Abstract This paper makes the case that a Pluriversal Social Design should be desire-based. It suggests that the creation of meaningful social change requires moving the focus of design processes from needs to agentic desires. The author understands agentic desire as the creative impulse towards human flourishing. In social design, the current emphasis on needs makes designers continually reproduce the Eurocentric model of life, hindering the creation of genuine alternatives. Moreover, centering collaborative relationships (designing with) on people’s basic needs is often disempowering. Desire-based design is a transformative practice that aims to break with normalcy and orthodoxy (i.e. the familiar way of doing things) to create and recognize alternatives. In the typical process, the designer starts with a need or problem and looks for a desirable solution. This paper suggests the opposite, engaging with desire as a starting point, in an open-ended exploration, and emphasizing people’s agency.