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trends and future of sustainable development - TransEco

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SUSTAINABILITY AWARENESS IN DESIGN - BRIDGINGTHE GAP BETWEEN DESIGN RESEARCH ANDPRACTICEOuti Ugas 1 <strong>and</strong> Cindy Kohtala 21 Kausaali Oy, Helsinki, Finl<strong>and</strong>2 Aalto University School <strong>of</strong> Art <strong>and</strong> Design, Helsinki, Finl<strong>and</strong>ABSTRACT – This paper reports on the preliminary findings <strong>of</strong> a study on how design practitionersin Finl<strong>and</strong> underst<strong>and</strong> sustainability <strong>and</strong> implement sustainability principles. Our <strong>future</strong> aim is toemploy this Barometer in determining how to best promote more <strong>sustainable</strong> innovation-oriented,design-centred practice in Finnish industry. Our hypothesis is that there is a crucial gap betweenacademic research <strong>and</strong> pr<strong>of</strong>essional practice in implementing design-for-sustainability. Moreover inour previous research we detected a gap between how human-centred designers (HCD) (implicatingsocial sustainability principles) <strong>and</strong> eco-designers (implicating environmental sustainabilityprinciples) perceive their scope <strong>of</strong> responsibility. Initial findings from our survey indicate that this gapis possibly less significant than designers’ capability to address the interface between the user <strong>and</strong> theecosystem as well as the user <strong>and</strong> the wider social tissue. In fact, a greater difference seems to existbetween product (“material”) <strong>and</strong> service (“immaterial”) designers in their prioritization: theirperceived scope <strong>of</strong> responsibility (jurisdiction) <strong>and</strong> definition <strong>of</strong> design value. Our guiding frameworkis the Framework for Strategic Sustainable Development FSSD.1. IntroductionThe objective <strong>of</strong> this paper is to describe the current status <strong>of</strong> <strong>sustainable</strong> design practice in Finl<strong>and</strong>,according to our ongoing Sustainable Design Barometer project. We describe the background <strong>and</strong>motivation behind the project, our hypotheses, the logic behind the design <strong>of</strong> the Barometer, <strong>and</strong> someinitial findings.The core <strong>of</strong> the Sustainable Design Barometer Project is an extensive survey, the goal <strong>of</strong> which is tocreate a reliable tool for pr<strong>of</strong>iling designers <strong>and</strong> design competences in terms <strong>of</strong> responsibility, definition<strong>of</strong> success, sustainability, idealism <strong>and</strong> other attitudes or worldviews. Our st<strong>and</strong>point is that in order todrive the <strong>development</strong> <strong>and</strong> implementation <strong>of</strong> <strong>sustainable</strong> solutions <strong>and</strong> eco-innovation, designpractitioners need robust underst<strong>and</strong>ing <strong>and</strong> acceptance <strong>of</strong> sustainability principles <strong>and</strong> competence in<strong>future</strong>-oriented systems thinking. A carefully designed Barometer can detect where the gaps lie in bothknowledge/knowhow <strong>and</strong> attitude/mindset between designing for the (un<strong>sustainable</strong>) status quo <strong>and</strong>designing for a <strong>sustainable</strong> society. Only by mapping the current status <strong>and</strong> the gaps can we robustly514

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