OUGD601: Cop Proposal feedback

'Melissa Morris

This is a very good proposal, though the topic is still a bit vague for my liking. I think that the research project would work, if you had a set idea of a company / charity that you would wish to work with. The million dollar question is who would this be? Obviously, finding a company based in the UK would give you the opportunity to contact people for useful primary research. The idea of collaborating with a company as a live practice based research project is certainly exciting. I would suggest that, depending on whom you chose to work with, your secondary research would become less concerned with abstract notions of ‘good design, and more concerned with contextual research specific to that organisation.'

As Richard has said, to begin with I started with quite broad research and have found this quite difficult. To move forward within my research project I am in the process of identifying a charity which I want to work with/ who would want to work with myself. As a lot of the major charities have design already I am going to look at smaller local charities who benefit more from the work I create. 

OUGD601: Secondary Research- Design and Ethics: Reflections on Practice

https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=m0oWywvtS10C&pg=PA12&lpg=PA12&dq=design+ethics+theorists&source=bl&ots=JYS4wJ0kFS&sig=Qp-e71MA-F5xRozO4J7DQ7Af8KM&hl=en&sa=X&ei=am2NVZ3DN8TV7gaL4r6wBw&ved=0CC0Q6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=design%20ethics%20theorists&f=false

page 3. 'Design is undergoing reconceptualisation triggered by debates about its potential to instigate meaningful social, cultural and environmental change.'

page 3. 'a growing consensus about environmental fragility, and how practices of production and consumption are contributing to an unsustainable future, underpins a discourse that sees the potential of design to be a transformative.'

page 3. 'There is little disagreement that we are witnessing an 'ethical turn' occurring in the professional and allied practises, including the design fields. This reconceptualisation extends design's role- and that of practitioner's responsibility- beyond stylistic enhancement, or the quest for optimal product solutions, to account for the aesthetic dimensions of human experience and the consequences of creative decision-making underpinning design process. The traditional roles of the design, designer and designed object are thus redefined through new understandings of the relationship between the material and immaterial aspects of design, where the design product and process are understood as embodiments of ideas, values and beliefs. This notion brings to the fore central questions around social responsibility, sustainability and consideration for the life of the object beyond the design studio.'

page 3/4. 'Taking a cross-disciplinary approach to ethics requires a recognition of the plurality of opinions, practices and socio-cultural perspectives, and the opportunity to open established value systems to questioning and renegotiation.'

page 10. 'The question of ethics is a question that defines the values that an individual would live by in order to increase the possibility of generating common 'good' with others, in corollary, eschew 'bad' relations that reduce their capacities as human beings.'

page 10. 'Other questions the subscription to human moral imperatives of thinking and doing 'right' or 'wrong'.'

page 10. 'Design disciplines are not exempt from this phenomenon. After all, design and designers are implicated in the generation of materialisation of much of what can loosely be considered the artificial or constructed environment.'

page 11. 'As in all disciplines, the designer is an ethical subject at two levels. First, as a practioner, a person who acts professionally in the name of a discipline, or whose actions can be described as subscribing to the commonly understood tenets that identify a discipline.' 

page 11. 'a designer is an ambassador for the moral obligations of the disciplines of design. Disciplinarity affects thinking and action by providing frameworks for how we are able to see and organise what we are able to say.'

page 11. 'the designer is a human citizen outside disciplinary qualifications, where she or he is subject to more general, and perhaps universally accepted, values that govern relations with other human citizens.'

page 11. 'Concerns surrounding design's impact on the biophysical realm, including natural ecosystems, spawned a generation of approaches under the ambit of 'environmental ethics', which are often mistakenly made synonymous with the much used but highly abused notion of 'sustainable design'. The impact of design on the environment forces designers to confront their practises and the effects these have on other human beings in the short term'. 

page 13. 'the relationship between the 'good' and ethics relies upon careful negotiation of the territories between the 'good' and ethics, and between design and ethics, as the study of the relations between ethics and design is often more complicated by a circular argument. Ethics- at least in the normative ethics or moral theory is generally argued to involve both a theory of the 'right' and of the 'good'. The right relates to knowledge of a moral imperative and involves metaphysical ideas of justice, virtue and ethos, whereas the good can be defined in terms of value based on a 'positive' benefit defeated by action, as in 'good design'- the criteria for which comes, in a circular fashion, from knowledge of, and feeling for, the 'right'. That is, 'good' design is generally defined as 'ethically sound', which is assumed to mean accessible, useful and safe, all of which arrive from a moral imperative that stems from a metaphysical knowledge of the right- and around it goes.'

196. 'The project of rethinking design practice has been taken up by design theorists who take debate beyond the designed object to encompass conceptions of design practice as an ongoing, lived activity, which is capable of transforming our lived experience both in terms of the objects we use and also the way we operate in our world.'

OUGD601: Secondary Research- The Morals and Ethics of A Theory of Design Thinking

The Morals and Ethics of A Theory of Design Thinking

http://www.academia.edu/4390557/The_Morals_and_Ethics_of_A_Theory_of_Design_Thinking

page 1. 'Morals are understood as abstract beliefs and principles that constitute the character of an individual or that collectively refer to the character of a group or community of individuals. Morals are potential responses not yet applied to the situations that would test them.'

page 1. 'Ethics on the other hand, is understood as how morality is put into practice when the interests and perspectives of other people, circumstances, and things are considered and the greater good is sought for all. Where morality builds disposition to seek improvement, ethics assures that the morals of individuals are fairly and justly applied to achieve the greatest good for all effected'.

page 3. "moral and ethical values arise through personal experiences, their situated interpretation, evaluation, and assimilation. These values vary with individuals, disciplines and cultures. They can be implicit or explicit in the reasons for designing and in the choices made during design.'

page 3. 'The values of Responsibility, Referential accuracy, Goodness of fit, Appropriate expression, Effectiveness, Fairness, and Wellbeing are suggested as the modern moral and ethical values that designing encourages. These principles avoid the burden of guilt that traditional moral and ethical principles arising from tribalism, nationalism and religion (such as honour, patriotism, shame, humility, remorse and redemption) do.' 

page 3. 'Instead the development of self respect, empathy, compassion, effectiveness, conscience, and justice are given an operational foundation in practical and cultural experience while moral outrage and mercy are transformed into commitments to improve the circumstances involved'.

OUGD601: Secondary Research- ethical design practises

http://www.davidairey.com/how-ethical-are-your-design-practices/

'If, at the beginning of design self-employment, you feel bad for working with a cause you don’t support, you can always balance the scales by providing a service to local non-profits and giving a little back to the community.'

http://www.davidairey.com/ethics-in-design/

From looking at this writer and the primary research he did by using Twitter it is interesting to see that each individual has their own ethical/moral boundaries so therefore perhaps ethics as Eileen MacAvery Kane's book suggests- ethics is complex and moral choices are a part of it too. 

OUGD601: Secondary Research- Ethics for the starving designer (manifesto)

This project was created by a design student in Singapore who wanted to create awareness locally of ethics within design. He mentions the first things first manifesto which I have looked at previously and the fact that designers are unsure whether they should complete work for causes they don't agree on. This modern day version of a ethical manifesto is more realistic and flexible compared to the first things first manifestos- it is created for students and local designers of Singapore and therefore is simple to follow for all designers regardless of how successful or wealthy they are which is something the first things first manifesto seems to ignore. 

OUGD601: Secondary Research- Digital Arts Feature

http://www.digitalartsonline.co.uk/features/illustration/design-ethics-can-you-stick-your-beliefs/

'Unlike doctors, lawyers or the police, designers are not often forced to make life-and-death ethical decisions. But the messages designers choose to impart and how they communicate them may have the power to influence many lives. What, then, are a designer’s ethical responsibilities in the creative process?'

'Unless you’re freelance – or the boss – deciding which accounts to work on is often out of your hands.'

'But should designers only work with clients that reflect their personal ethos? Illustrator Lizzie Mary Cullen believes that the very nature of design and illustration means that you can be divorced from the intentions of your clients without being unethical. “I’m not a moral compass,” she says. “The wonderful thing about being an illustrator is the upfront nature of it. An artist may say, ‘I don’t want to sell out,’ but for an illustrator that’s our profession. We get paid to present a certain idea, brand or view.”'

OUGD601: Secondary Research- Eye Magazine "Being Good"

http://www.eyemagazine.com/opinion/article/being-good1

'The current interest in ethics and its relationship to design seems a jolly ‘good’ thing to me – indicative of increased scrutiny of what designers offer and what they leave behind. But this is a convoluted and protean business and is not to be confused with the notion of ‘selling designer souls’. This rather comical phrase is sometimes misunderstood as shorthand for ethical awareness, but it focuses the debate on the individual designer soul – ethics is a bit bigger than that.'

'Within philosophy, ethics is the branch of knowledge concerned with moral principles. This is not primarily in order to develop strategies by which to judge one another. It is about the pursuit of truth – questioning whether there is such a thing as the property of ‘goodness’'

'When ‘ethics’ and ‘graphic design’ are put in the same sentence, two subjects inevitably come to mind. One is that of production methods – recycled paper and so on. The other is the client. ‘The client’ is shorthand for ‘the client’s message’. The job of graphic design is generally to persuade – so do we have a responsibility to be mindful of what we are persuading people to do or does this role as censor sit uncomfortably alongside tolerance and open-mindedness?'

'The free market has delivered enormous choice, but design plays a part in encouraging insatiable desire – with the resultant discontent and environmental consequences. Capitalism thrives by encouraging entrepreneurialism – which is perfect for many designers – but design is a competitive business that requires enormous self-belief and self-determination, and therefore engenders insecurity and envy in its practitioners. Does being successful within this framework necessitate bad behaviour? Should we be more critical of what we consider to be design achievement?'

'For many designers the property of goodness lies primarily in aesthetics. When a piece of work is deemed ‘good’, really what we mean is either that it is to our taste or that we think it has merit for expressing the zeitgeist or being ground-breaking in some way.'

'However, if we consider aesthetics more deeply, it relates directly to ‘goodness’ in an ethical sense. Is our work good if it engenders happiness, for example – if it adds to someone’s quality of life by making the world a more delightful or pleasurable place?'

'We don’t need to have experienced something to imagine what we would feel if we were in a similar situation to someone else. Almost all world religions and secular belief systems agree on one principle: the ‘golden rule’, or ethic of reciprocity, that says: ‘treat others as you would wish to be treated’. What this prescribes is consistency between our desires for ourselves and for others. Applying this rule within design might mean we are more polite, take plagiarism more seriously, argue for environmentally friendly print techniques or advocate inclusive design.'

'The value of considering ethics in any activity lies partly in being forced to question the fundamental nature of things. For designers, the eye may be the window of the soul – but one that is looking out rather than in.'

OUGD601: Secondary Research- Eileen MacAvery Kane

The books I have been looking at and how I am reading them is through a particular stance as my dissertation is focusing on the idea of moral choices and ethics from a human perspective. This book in particular was interesting to read because it isn't necessarily theories on design and ethics it was mainly stating what current issues there are. 

Ethics: a graphic designer's field guide- Eileen MacAvery Kane

'by definition ethics means "the rules or standards of governing the conduct of members of a profession", "a set of principles of right conduct", and "the study of the general nature of moral choices to be made by a person". page VI

'Using these definitions as a starting point, we can explore and discuss ethics in graphic design through three lenses: 

1) legalities- the rules that govern the profession- copyright law, piracy, plagiarism, fair use,photo manipulation

2) integrity- principles of right conduct- spec work, crowdsourcing, responsibility to clients and contracts

3) morality- the general nature of moral choices to be made by a person- sustainability, social responsibility, cultural influence 

page 31.  (morality) 'Graphic designers regularly create visual communication that's consumed by the masses. Issues like brand sketching, social responsibility, sustainability, and green washing all warrant examination through the lens of morality' 

page 40. 'Social responsibility in graphic design has advocates in both the private sector and the public sector, in large organisations and small, and on an individual basis' 

page 41. 'Across the glide as well as on an individual level, graphic designers are being challenged to create work thats socially responsible'.

page41. 'Being a part of a project as big and rewarding as 'water for India' allowed me to realise first-hand that design is not just about marketing a product or making a bottom line, but rather it can be rewarding on a human scale. Working with 'Engineers without Borders' showed me design can be collaborative and used for the greater good' Alexander Sangeorge. 

page 32. 'A major ethical dilemma is to be hired to work for a client whose products, services or actions are harmful, criminal, politically unacceptable, or are promoting violence and war, or foster morally unacceptable opinions or actions' Steff Geissbuhler. 

page 26. 'The ugly truth about design 'taboos'- work on speculation, plagiarism, piracy, work for hire, stock logos, cronyism, unsustainable design- is that they are being broken daily' DK Holland