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Futures

Participation is action that affects others.1 Nonhuman beings (biological and non-biological) shape processes, frame conversations, and influence outcomes.

Design proposals are situated interventions that suggest ways of being, living, or relating.2 Proposals are design decisions3 made manifest.

Personas are conceptual tools that represent groups of design stakeholders. They are fictional but data-driven. Their role is to guide design decisions. Personas can focus empathy, align design teams, and help assess design proposals.4 Typically, personas are treated as patients of design, that is, as recipients rather than agents. Nonhuman personas are possible, but current accounts cast them as influencers rather than makers of proposals.5 We extend the concept by focusing on personas of designers (human or nonhuman co-designers) rather than users; we call these designer personas. For a related concept, see the idea of a 'prototeam' to imagine possible future design teams.6

Resistance to change (inertia or momentum; 'resistance' has more active than passive connotations) is a systemic issue in sustainability paradigms, where design efforts remain within the industrial logic they seek to reform, so actual change is minimal.7 Transitional forms can reinforce the status quo despite their transgressive potential.8

Footnotes

  1. Rice, Louis. “Nonhumans in Participatory Design.” CoDesign 14, no. 3 (2018): 238–57. https://doi.org/10/gfvpfx.˄

  2. Westerlaken, Michelle. “It Matters What Designs Design Designs: Speculations on Multispecies Worlding.” Global Discourse 11, nos. 1–2 (2021): 137–55. https://doi.org/10/gjb7ms.˄

  3. Roudavski, Stanislav, and Douglas Brock. “From Dingoes to AI: Who Makes Decisions in More-than-Human Worlds?” TRACE ∴ Journal for Human-Animal Studies 11 (2025): 56–96. https://doi.org/10/g89xj8.˄

  4. Pruitt, John, and Tamara Adlin. The Persona Lifecycle: Keeping People in Mind throughout Product Design. Burlington: Elsevier, 2006.˄

  5. Tomitsch, Martin, Joel Fredericks, Dan Vo, Jessica Frawley, and Marcus Foth. “Non-Human Personas: Including Nature in the Participatory Design of Smart Cities.” Interaction Design and Architecture(s) Journal (IxD&A), no. 50 (2021): 102–30. https://doi.org/10/gpv9ch.˄

  6. Frauenberger, Christopher, Rachel Charlotte Smith, Daria Loi, Laura Forlano, and Ole Sejer Iversen. “Emerging Technologies and Alternative Futures.” In Routledge International Handbook of Contemporary Participatory Design, edited by Rachel Charlotte Smith, Daria Loi, Heike Winschiers-Theophilus, Liesbeth Huybrechts, and Jesper Simonsen, 139–64. London: Routledge, 2025.˄

  7. Fry, Tony. Design Futuring: Sustainability, Ethics and New Practice. Sydney: University of New South Wales Press, 2009.˄

  8. Huan, Qingzhi, ed. Eco-Socialism as Politics: Rebuilding the Basis of Our Modern Civilisation. Dordrecht: Springer, 2010.˄