While discussing design's incentives, conversations regularly broach the subject of aiding '3rd world' nations.
It is no secret that many 'first world' nations have historically amassed wealth and resources through the subjugation and abuse of weaker countries. Yet even today, under scrutiny, signs abundantly hint that the "Manifest Destiny" wolf is currently alive and well, now thriving under a democratic sheep's guise.
However, within these industrialized first world states, there are individuals genuinely attempting to soothe the woes of developing nations. These people have designed many wonderful products and services specifically around afflictions of the 3rd world. Early designs, such as Vestergaard-Frandsen's 'Lifestraw' and Envirofit's improved cooking stoves, are based around obvious basic human health needs.
More recently, primarily through the dissemination of cellphones and integrable services. work is begin committed towards building data infrastructures within developing nations. People such as Jan Chipchase and Natahn Eagle are laudably creating new ways to bolster health and economic growth solely through wirelessly attained knowledge and services.
Although human aid is a commendable task, we need to fully realize the implications of our actions. Who is financially backing the research? If a company is making an investment, they must expect a profitable return. We should always be examining their motives, and making sure corners are not being cut, potentially hurting their consumer base in exchange for slightly larger profit margins. Once upon a time, America thought nothing of immersing playing children in vast clouds of DDT. Today, without full understanding of the potentially carcinogenic properties of cellphone signals, we are heedlessly flooding Africa's nations with handheld devices.
To clarify, I am not advocating that cellphone usage leads to cancer. And even if it did, the gained utilitarian value probably offsets this cost for now. Simply, I urge discretion to those outside the box, attempting to design for those caught within.
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I strongly agree that understanding is key, however it is almost always not available and defiantly less available than many other aspects of the issue which can cause both more immediate improvements and increasingly calculated strategic improvements. There is no question that we can't understand the full implications of our interactions however there is also little question that a lot of good could be done and is not.
I think interestingly, at this point we are not seeing Western innovation being dropped on Africa we are seeing Western innovation being revitalised and re-understood in Africa, generally to make more flexible systems. Similarly, I think, we are not seeing a anything like a controlled implementation of Western ideas or services, instead we are seeing a distinct adaption, or recreation of service models and we are seeing the implementation of really fresh ways of dealing with issues most of the world has, on some level.
I think we should not give the West too much credit in the game.
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