The Craze for Design Thinking: Roots, A Critique, and toward an Alternative

Favouring orientation to and the participation of design users in the design process, Design Thinking (DT) has a long lineage. With the Cold War’s end the Internet’s rise and Stanford University turn to teaching DT (2005), this ‘bottom up’, demand-driven conception of design gained new adherents, going on to win mainstream status when advocated in the Harvard Business Review in 2008. While some managers, especially in government, have since adopted DT rather uncritically, it has prompted a schism in design circles – one as grand, perhaps, as that between post-Modernism and Modernism back in the 1970s/1980s. Though DT has reached Latin America and Asia, enthusiasts differ on its meaning. However, critics like Verganti (Italy) and Norman (US) are unanimous that DT has wrongly made consumer contexts, behaviours and needs seem preferable to what McCullagh (UK) describes as ‘other drivers of innovation, including technical progress’. In DT, ‘sustainability’ tends to be taken for granted, and expensive prices are rarely considered. An alternative to DT is briefly outlined, which, it is hoped, can begin to address these defects.