The world is on fire. Can design help save it?

A new book from Stanford design professors explores the radical potential of design to reshape our world for the better.

“In an environment that is screwed up visually, physically, and chemically, the best and simplest thing that architects, industrial designers, planners, etc., could do for humanity would be to stop working entirely,” wrote designer and educator Victor Papanek in his 1971 book, Design for The Real World. Fifty years later, there’s still a truth in Papanek’s critique that rings true to me. In this moment when it seems every system is collapsing in on itself—the rise of artificial intelligence, the instability of democracies, the ever-present climate crisis—the role of the designer can feel uncertain.