Design as Democracy

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xiv

   PDF

2. Introduction

   • David de la Peña, Diane Jones Allen, Randolph T. Hester Jr., Jeffrey Hou, Laura L. Lawson, Marcia J. McNally

   Pages 1-8

3. Suiting Up to Shed

   • David de la Peña, Diane Jones Allen, Randolph T. Hester Jr., Jeffrey Hou, Laura L. Lawson, Marcia J. McNally

   Pages 9-44

4. Going to the People’s Coming

   • David de la Peña, Diane Jones Allen, Randolph T. Hester Jr., Jeffrey Hou, Laura L. Lawson, Marcia J. McNally

   Pages 45-72

5. Experting: They Know, We Know, and Together We Know Better, Later

   • David de la Peña, Diane Jones Allen, Randolph T. Hester Jr., Jeffrey Hou, Laura L. Lawson, Marcia J. McNally

   Pages 73-100

6. Calming and Evoking

   • David de la Peña, Diane Jones Allen, Randolph T. Hester Jr., Jeffrey Hou, Laura L. Lawson, Marcia J. McNally

   Pages 101-132

7. “Yeah! That’s What We Should Do”

   • David de la Peña, Diane Jones Allen, Randolph T. Hester Jr., Jeffrey Hou, Laura L. Lawson, Marcia J. McNally

   Pages 133-164

8. Co-generating

   • David de la Peña, Diane Jones Allen, Randolph T. Hester Jr., Jeffrey Hou, Laura L. Lawson, Marcia J. McNally

   Pages 165-194

9. Engaging the Making

   • David de la Peña, Diane Jones Allen, Randolph T. Hester Jr., Jeffrey Hou, Laura L. Lawson, Marcia J. McNally

   Pages 195-224

10. Testing, Testing, Can You Hear Me? Do I Hear You Right?

    • David de la Peña, Diane Jones Allen, Randolph T. Hester Jr., Jeffrey Hou, Laura L. Lawson, Marcia J. McNally

    Pages 225-260

11. Putting Power to Good Use, Delicately and Tenaciously

    • David de la Peña, Diane Jones Allen, Randolph T. Hester Jr., Jeffrey Hou, Laura L. Lawson, Marcia J. McNally

    Pages 261-302

12. Conclusion

    • David de la Peña, Diane Jones Allen, Randolph T. Hester Jr., Jeffrey Hou, Laura L. Lawson, Marcia J. McNally

    Pages 303-307

13. Back Matter

    Pages 309-326

    PDF

Edited by six leading practitioners and academics in the field of participatory design, with nearly 50 contributors from around the world, this book shows how to design with communities in empowering and effective ways. The flow of the book’s nine chapters reflects the general progression of community design process, while also encouraging readers to search for ways that best serve their distinct needs and the culture and geography of diverse places. Each chapter presents a series of techniques around a theme, from approaching the initial stages of a project, to getting to know a community, to provoking political change through strategic thinking. Readers may approach the book as they would a cookbook, with recipes open to improvisation, adaptation, and being created anew.

• democratic design
• community design process
• justice and democracy
• hands-on democracy
• participatory design practices

• Department of Human Ecology, University of California, Davis, Davis, USA

  David Peña

• Design Jones LLC, New Orleans, USA

  Diane Jones Allen

• College of Environmental Design, University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, USA

  Randolph T. Hester

• Department of Landscape Architecture, University of Washington, Seattle, USA

  Jeffrey Hou

• Department of Landscape Architecture, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, USA

  Laura L. Lawson

• Department of Environmental Design, University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, USA

  Marcia J. McNally

David de la Peña is Assistant Professor of Landscape Architecture and Environmental Design in the Department of Human Ecology at the University of California–Davis. As an architect and urban designer, he has practiced professionally for over a decade, specializing in sustainable architecture and community-based design. He received his Masters in Architecture from the University of Texas–Austin (1998), and his Masters in Urban Design (2006) and PhD in Environmental Planning (2013) from the University of California–Berkeley. His research focus is on participatory urbanism and the engagement of designers in grassroots community projects. He has published articles and chapters on participatory design in Barcelona and the US, and on grassroots urban agriculture movements in California. Additionally he is a lead collaborator since 2013 on the US Department of Energy’s Solar Decathlon entries for UC–Davis, and is involved in numerous campus planning initiatives around communities for sustainable living and experiential learning.

Diane Jones Allen, ASLA, PLA, has a Doctorate in Transportation Civil Engineering, a Master of Landscape Architecture, and 27 years of diverse experience in private and public practice focused on the areas of land use design/planning, transportation planning, and large-scale residential and park design projects. As principal landscape architect, she has focused on projects that affected the quality of life of community residents, whether it was strategic planning for county/parish development, site planning for public housing, urban design for a new transportation corridor, or design of a community playground. The purpose of the work throughout her professional career has been to have positive effect on the physical environment in which people live. The focus has been to bring equity, access, and enhancement to the quality of life of communities of various scales.



Randolph T. Hester Jr. is a founder of the Participatory Design Movement in landscape architecture. For 50 years he has engaged communities in transactive design, developing innovative techniques as new needs are identified. He has created internationally acclaimed democratic landscapes in places as diverse as Manteo, North Carolina, Los Angeles and Taiwan. His first books, Neighborhood Space (1975) and Community Goal Setting (1982), provide now classic techniques to uncover and apply cultural nuances to participatory design. Planning Neighborhood Space With People (1984) and Community Design Primer (1990) spell out a 12-step participatory process and a collection of his most effective design techniques to achieve civicness, cultural expression, and environmental justice. Design for Ecological Democracy (2006) describes a visionary yet achievable future based on enabling, resilient and impelling form. Hester is Professor Emeritus at the University of California–Berkeley and Director of the Center for Ecological Democracy.



Jeffrey Hou is Professor and Chair of Landscape Architecture at the University of Washington–Seattle. Focusing on design activism, public space, and cross-cultural placemaking, he is an author and editor of several books, including Greening Cities, Growing Community: Learning from Seattle’s Urban Community Gardens (2009), Insurgent Public Space: Guerrilla Urbanism and the Remaking of Contemporary Cities (2010), Transcultural Cities: Border-Crossing and Placemaking (2013), Now Urbanism: the Future City is Here (2015), and Messy Urbanism: Understanding the “Other” Cities of Asia (2016). Hou is a leading scholar in community design and service-learning education. In a career that spans across the Pacific, he has worked with indigenous tribes, farmers, and fishers in Taiwan, neighborhood residents in Japan, villagers in China, and inner-city immigrant youths and elders in North American cities. He is recipient of EDRA Places Book Award in 2010 and 2012 and the CELA Award of Excellence in Service-Learning Education in 2011.



Laura Lawson is Dean of Agriculture and Urban Programs and Chair of the Department of Landscape Architecture in the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey. She received her Masters in Landscape Architecture and PhD in Environmental Planning from the University of California–Berkeley. Her research includes historical and contemporary urban agriculture and community open space. Her scholarship includes City Bountiful: A Century of Community Gardening in America (2005), Greening Cities, Growing Communities: Learning from Seattle’s Urban Community Gardens (2009), and numerous articles and book chapters. Dr. Lawson teaches community-based design studios and seminars focused on social issues in design and planning, participatory design, and the public landscape. In her role as dean, Dr. Lawson supports academic and outreach efforts that connect urban and suburban communities with agriculture in order to enhance the economy, landscape and culture of New Jersey.



Marcia McNally is an educator and award-winning landscape planner recognized as a leader in international environmental mobilization as well as the on-the-ground practice of citizen participation. McNally teaches annually at Chung Yuan University–Taiwan, and the University of California–Berkeley (as professor emeritus in Landscape Architecture and Environmental Planning). In 2010 McNally relocated to Durham, North Carolina, where she directs The Neighborhood Laboratory. Continuing her research on social factors, her current work includes investigation of 16 local parks in the Pudong Expansion Area of Shanghai to document the importance of nearby open space to the daily lives of elderly residents. She is the co-founder of SAVE International (Spoonbill Action Voluntary Echo), a grassroots organization that for 19 years has worked to protect the critically endangered Black-faced Spoonbill and its habitat throughout its flyway in East Asia by promoting alternative economic development and long-term sustainability of the ecosystems and local communities.

Policies and ethics