Designing public futures: how civic design transforms policy and participation

After a three-year application process, I received my green card last week. Although it grants permanent residency rather than citizenship, it represents a milestone in both personal and professional terms. With this new status, I now have greater freedom to live and work in the US—a shift that brings both relief and a renewed sense of possibility.

This transition also sparked deeper reflection on the role and relevance of design within the context of government. Gaining legal permanence prompted me to reconsider how, as a designer and immigrant, I might contribute more actively to civic life. In particular, it led me to reexamine the notion of civic design: what it entails, how it functions, and why it matters. In this article, I explore civic design through three interconnected lenses:

1. Exploring the notion of civic design
2. Introducing a civic design framework focusing on six conversation types.
3. Offering two case studies about civic design in public service innovation.

By linking personal experiences to broader systemic questions, I aim to gain a deeper understanding of how design can serve as a bridge between individuals and institutions, and as a means of shaping more inclusive civic and urban futures.

What is civic design?

As an Asian immigrant raised in a traditional family, I had limited exposure to the concept of civic design. I often questioned whether it was inherently political and if so, whether it was even appropriate for someone like me to engage in such conversations publicly. These uncertainties shaped my initial hesitation to approach the topic.

This hesitation began to shift as I encountered more expansive and inclusive definitions of civic design. Scholars Carl DiSalvo and Christopher Le Dantec (2017), in their Interactions article, outlined three critical insights that broadened my perspective: 

1. Civic design is a collective endeavor, drawing from diverse disciplines, methods, and theories.
2. Civic designers act as embedded collaborators who need to navigate relationships with communities, government entities, and civil society. 
3. Civic design necessitates a critical approach to participation, resistance, and the politics of engagement.

Stevie Bal (2022), writing in Local People, describes it as “discovering and delivering solutions that are shaped by the holistic experiences of everyone in a community who is affected by a public service.” Similarly, NakedCivics (2017) defines the notion of civic design as “a practice that focuses on the common good outcomes of our communities by pulling upon all of the institutional tools in our communities, beyond our traditional sole focus on government alone.”

These interpretations helped me reimagine civic design not as a narrowly political endeavor but as a human-centered practice grounded in collective care, public engagement, and social equity. Rather than being confined to designing communications, products, or services in conventional ways, civic design emerged as a resilient and participatory platform—one that enables communities to shape their futures and amplifies voices often left out of traditional decision-making processes.

This evolving understanding ultimately led me to a deeper inquiry: How can we, as designers, contribute to government through, with, and by design? Here, “design” is not about aesthetics but about the processes, methods, and mindsets that foster inclusion, participation, and transparency—platforms that reflect and respond to the lived realities and aspirations of diverse communities (Figure 1).

The civic design framework focusing on six conversation types

In Design as Democratic Inquiry: Putting Experimental Civics into Practice, DiSalvo (2022) frames design as a mode of inquiry into democracy. He defines civics as “democracy on a micro scale,” highlighting everyday situated experiences that foster collective agency, unity, and community.

This view aligns with my understanding that civic design is not only about creative outputs but also about reimagining how we live and participate together. DiSalvo (2022) emphasizes that civic design experiments weave together making, political theory, and social structures to enable democratic engagement.

Building on this foundation, MIT’s Civic Design Network and the We Who Engage initiative introduced the Civic Design Framework in 2021 to help translate democratic inquiry into action. The framework includes six types of conversations for public engagement, each supporting inclusive, participatory processes:

1. Framing – Creating a Shared Understanding. How an issue is framed determines what solutions become imaginable. Public framing conversations enable diverse perspectives to emerge, fostering a deeper understanding of challenges and broadening the range of potential responses. As in the early stages of the design process, framing requires integrating varied voices to ensure that the right questions are being asked.

2. Ideation – Generating Possibilities. These conversations encourage the public to propose imaginative, even improbable solutions. The emphasis is not on consensus, but on collective exploration and discovery. This mirrors the brainstorming phase in design, where divergent thinking opens up multiple paths forward.

3. Prioritizing – Weighing the Values of Choices. Once options are generated, prioritizing conversations involves assessing their relative merits and trade-offs. Public participants collectively identify which alternatives offer the most just and feasible improvements. Designers similarly prioritize based on constraints such as time, resources, and impact.

4. Deciding – Choosing a Direction. Decision-making requires selecting from viable alternatives. Transparent conversations about trade-offs foster mutual understanding and resilience, even in the face of disagreement. This parallels the strategic planning phase in design, where trade-offs are negotiated in collaboration with stakeholders.

5. Implementing – Taking Action. Civic engagement continues into implementation. These conversations invite the public to participate in decision-making and hold institutions accountable. In design, this corresponds to translating ideas into outcomes, thereby bridging the gap between ideation and production.

6. Monitoring – Ensuring Accountability. Post-implementation, monitoring conversations evaluate whether outcomes align with intentions. These reflections create a feedback loop that informs future framing and decision-making. In design, this approach resembles iterative refinement, where continuous feedback enhances both the process and the outcome.

Together, these six civic conversation types—Framing, Ideation, Prioritizing, Deciding, Implementing, and Monitoring—form a structured yet flexible framework for democratic engagement. Closely aligned with human-centered design (HCD), this model supports communities in co-creating or participatory (Figure 2) design of more responsive and accountable civic systems.

Civic design in action: public service innovation

In 2003, Taiwan’s Ministry of Economic Affairs recognized design as a strategic tool to bridge the gaps between government, industry, and society. This foundational emphasis on design laid the groundwork for subsequent national initiatives. As a result, the Taiwan Design Research Institute (TDRI) was established in 2020 to advance a robust design innovation ecosystem.

Positioned within the evolving discourse of civic design, TDRI’s role can be further understood through the lens of the Civic Design Framework. This framework outlines six interrelated types of civic conversations that guide democratic engagement and co-creation: 1. framing the right challenges, 2. generating ideas in collaboration with government, industry, and communities, 3. prioritizing stakeholder needs and goals, 4. deciding on appropriate and inclusive solutions based on the resources, 5. implementing feasible actions in the specific context, and 6. monitoring outcomes to ensure accountability.

Case 1: Pictogram Redesign for Public Spaces

By adopting the Civic Design Framework, we can better understand how TDRI can strengthen its mission and more effectively foster inclusive, participatory design practices that serve the public good. For example, in 2023, TDRI partnered with the Ministry of Transportation and Communications, the Ministry of Health and Welfare, the National Land Management Agency, and the Resource Circulation Administration of the Ministry of Environment to develop a comprehensive guidebook of public pictograms.

The guidebook features over 300 icons spanning eight categories—public facilities, transportation, tourism, sports and recreation, commercial venues, public instructions, safety, and accessibility—designed in accordance with International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and Japanese Industrial Standards (JIS). 

As illustrated in Figure 3, this initiative exemplifies the first type of civic conversation: Framing. Through collaboration among TDRI, government agencies, industry partners, and community stakeholders, the project identified critical gaps and opportunities to improve Taiwan’s public visual wayfinding system across these categories.

To ensure the icons were accessible and practical, the team invited 245 participants—diverse in age, gender, physical ability, and language background—to test the design outcomes (Figure 4). This inclusive testing process aimed to validate that the icons were simple, intuitive, language-independent, and easily understood across a wide demographic.

The testing workshop also reflected the progression of civic conversations following Ideation, specifically Prioritizing, Deciding, Implementing, and Monitoring. By engaging participants in evaluating usability and clarity, the project embedded civic design principles into each stage, transforming feedback into actionable refinements and reinforcing accountability through iterative validation.

By clearly framing the challenges and aligning diverse perspectives, the effort not only enhances the aesthetic and functional quality of public environments but also strengthens national identity, cultivates civic awareness, and reinforces the broader value of civic design.

Case 2: Public Bus Information Design Standard

Continuing its civic design efforts, TDRI collaborated again in 2024 with the Ministry of Transportation and Communications to conduct ethnographic research and publish the Information Design Standard for Taiwan Public Bus (Figure 5). This guidebook addresses elements such as vehicle interior and exterior design, signage, typography, color schemes, and overall user experience. 

Figure 6 captures a moment when proposed solutions emerged from a series of on-site coordination meetings, involving not only designers but also key stakeholders. These discussions were supported by on-site measurements and design verification conducted directly on public buses. As a result of these findings, TDRI recommended revising existing regulations on bus wayfinding systems to improve clarity, usability, and the overall user experience.

The incorporation of on-site ethnographic research provided critical contextual insights that informed both design and policy decisions. This approach highlights the importance of the Deciding and Implementing stages, the fourth and fifth civic conversation types, by ensuring that design recommendations were grounded in real-world conditions and stakeholder discussion collectively.

These initiatives exemplify how civic and public service design can foster citizen engagement and embed the design process into the fabric of everyday public systems and experiences. 

From civic design to civic relations

There remains significant potential for growth and learning within the design field, particularly in the realm of civic design. Civic design is inherently collaborative, not only because it invites community members to participate and contribute their lived experiences, but also because diverse methods, perspectives, and cultural histories shape it. This pluralism influences the design process and outcome, and the decision-making it supports.

Such a perspective aligns with MIT’s Civic Design Framework introduced earlier, which is inspired by and adapted from HCD principles. By structuring civic engagement into six types of conversations—Framing, Ideation, Prioritizing, Deciding, Implementing, and Monitoring—the framework enables individuals and communities to co-create more responsive and accountable civic systems. These structured interactions shift civic design from a focus on technical outputs to a process that fosters enduring civic relationships rooted in participation and collective agency.

This shift from transactional models of governance to relational models of civic life echoes the argument put forth by Carl DiSalvo and Christopher A. Le Dantec (2017) in their article Civic Design published in Interactions. They contend that cities should be considered as networks of civic relationships, where the customer-provider dynamic is only one of many. By embracing the inherent complexity and ambiguity of civic design, we can also think of a broader range of accountabilities—whether embedded in institutional processes, infrastructure systems, or data-driven decision-making practices.

By adopting a design lens rooted in accountability, pluralism, and participation, I believe we can transition from transactional governance to a relational civic life. Through inclusive conversations, such as framing, decision-making, and implementation, we can build systems that are not only designed for the public but also shaped with the public.

References

• Design as Democratic Inquiry: Putting Experimental Civics into Practice
• What is Civic Design? 
• Civic Design
• We Who Engage
• Taiwan Design Research Institute (TDRI)
• NakedCivics