A central assertion of this whole body of thought is that the fundamental philosophy found at the heart of design is, in all cases, both antithetical to and superior to any ideology. Design processes are more sensible than litigious processes. Design thinking holds more problem solving potential than legalistic thinking. Creativity, curiosity, and deliberation are cognitive states which are opposed to, and superior to, telemetry, certainty, and the pursuit of fixed ideals. It is not that design is an alternative to the political; it is that design thinking is a better way to approach the political than ideological thinking.
Having worked as a designer mostly in service to people struggling under the burdens of ideology for a decade and a half, I find this assertion to be almost the definition of design itself.
Consider these differences between the two ways of thinking:
- An ideology presupposes an image of the ends to be achieved and sets about fitting the circumstances and people involved into that end state.
- Design frameworks assert that desirable outcomes are subject to the conditions of the circumstantial scope and the interests and capacities of the stakeholders.
- An ideology asserts a linear progression toward a fixed state, presupposing that the people — having achieved their aim — will have solved at least their major problems.
- Design processes assume a cyclical nature to problem/solution relationships. Each design solution reveals new problems, which may be larger or smaller than the initial scope.
- To an ideologue, it is obvious that Russia should be a communist state because all nations should be communist. And communism is treated as more essential than the people of Russia themselves.
- To a designer, the people of Russia are essential. Analysis of the specific needs of Russia’s various peoples is the best way to find out what should be done to solve their problems.
- To apply an ideology is cathartic and satisfying to the ego — even when losing.
- Design is frustrating. It requires honesty, self-doubt, and is only satisfying when the solution sings.
- Ideologues secretly love losing because the commiseration in defeat and collective blame of the opponent reinforces their social bonds.
- Designers have to take responsibility for losses. Losses have to be studied, understood, and corrected. Only in completing this cycle might they allow themselves to celebrate a loss.
- To follow an ideology is to assume that the best thinking has already been done by designated academics — the more German the better.
- To design is to begin with absolute trust in the process, to proceed by listening deeply, surgically reducing every assumption to its raw vulnerable bits, thinking win/win, committing to empathy, ruthlessly iterating and discarding failed ideas, painstakingly crafting a solution, and — in the end — shipping something we believe it. Only when our precious solution is out of our hands do we turn with the rage of an ocean storm on the process itself — and apply the process.
- To subscribe to an ideology is easy, and it’s a fast way to make lots of friends.
- Design, good design, is difficult. Good design is so exacting and honest that it will cost some friends.
One of the biggest hints that none of the political ideologies in the market of ideas is all that great is not only that they all have their share of complete assholes, but that they all more or less tolerate their own assholes while vilifying everyone else’s.
No group of people who protects their own assholes while attacking the assholes of opposing groups has a suitable whole-systems solution to offer in response to the problems of society. Because they haven’t solved the primary problem of society within their own community — assholes.
And every political milieu can be described this way. If any ideological framework held the secret to people living in such a way that no one who used that framework could end up treating people badly then, minimally, it would stand out because the adherents of that ideology would treat, at the bear minimum, their own people better than people of inferior ideologies treat their own people. But there is no such ideological group.
Loads of peace-loving, organic gardening, free-schooling, anarchists betray and malign each other as easily and quickly as dripped out, day-trading pick-up artists. No shortage of leave-no-trace, self care evangelist, sparkle pony Burners leave piles of trash in Fernley and do lines off the edge of the same trough they use for Instagram cold plunges. Hoards of 2A, preper, honorary history scholar, watch dog, fire team bros, would risk a massive coronary event if they sprinted a block and don’t even rotate their larder. All of these communities have some sagely and devoted heroes, people who do everything they can to live their principles. There are also some posers doing the bare minimum of only the most superficial crap to fit in. And, most people are in the middle, just trying to belong somewhere and hold to some context for what they’re doing with their lives. It’s the same with every milieu, scene, and interest group.
Years ago, I watched hours of an annual convening of the libertarian national political party — on like actual rabbit-ears TV. It was kinda cool to see people really using Robert’s Rules of Order. They made the U.S. Congress look like a pack of staggering drunks. Aside from that, it was just as much of a shit show. People took turns appropriately, but when it was their turn they were just as inconsiderate of the positions and concerns of others as the participants in a congressional session. They evaded direct questions, employed deceptive rhetoric, and did nothing to foster good faith — just like real politicians. They were just orderly and polite about it.
I want to take this moment to make note that to be inconsiderate and to be rude have no direct relationship — despite being frequently concurrent. In discussing this with people, I’ve noticed that this understanding is evaporating with the decline of literacy, and we are all the worse for not making space in our thinking for such matters. This is why we can’t have nice friends.
I used to work for the Green Party and part of my job was to prep people to testify in front of legislative bodies. I wouldn’t say that I was a lobbyist, but mostly because I wasn’t making lobbyist money. In prepping people to speak, we would have them go over what they wanted to say and just correct them when they started to go off platform. We took people who knew what they wanted to say and we pressured them to adhere to party platform talking points. We more or less told people that if they said things wrong they’d be responsible for the death of all the bees. It was more polite than that, but it was that manipulative. It was instrumentalist. And it was wrong. That was the goddamn Green Party. Think of what red and blue parties must be like. And, I’m not blaming anyone else. I did that. Me. I did it because I believed it was what needed to be done. I believed that winning was what was important. Now, I don’t think that it matters if you win if the person you become through winning isn’t a person worth being. It’s very Pixar, but that’s Truth. And, on the whole, Green Party folks are pretty cool. I miss the literal parties, those were good times. Our job was to improve the world. That’s a pretty awesome job. We were doing our best. But our best wasn’t good enough. Because, our job wasn’t to do our best. Our job was to make a more just, enduring, and vital society. We weren’t doing that. We were nerfing playgrounds, accidentally inventing cable logging, and losing most of our campaigns for actual meaningful legislation by wide margins.
We consistently lost, both the campaigns and our own integrity, with the best of intentions.
I can throw tons of movements under the bus, and throughout the book I probably will. But, the simple truth is that all of these movements are made up of some of society’s best people (with a few true villains sprinkled in to keep things interesting). Generally, though, movement folks are the people who answered the call to do their best to fix problems whether or not the problems were over their heads when they heard the call. And, in the exertion, we are usually improved for our efforts — even, or especially, when we clearly see that we failed to improve anything else.
People do their best, and that’s beautiful.
Also, we need to have a conversation about making our best better.
I believe that a very good place to start is by questioning the very practice of cultivating and adhering to ideologies. All ideologies.
“I discovered that when I believed my thoughts, I suffered, but that when I didn’t believe them, I didn’t suffer, and that this is true for every human being. Freedom is as simple as that.” — Byron Katie
Thank you so very much for sticking with me this far. This particular line of thinking is a doozy. In what follows I’m going to talk about: the various things that could be meant by ‘ideology’ and ‘ideals’, why ideology is so appealing and even legitimately useful, why ideology and politics are not inseparable, why I believe that attachment to ideologies erodes moral capacity — regardless of what that ideology is, the connection between materialism and ideology, and a more optimistic closing about how personal goals and visions are not at all the same as prescriptive ideologies.
Seriously. Thank you. I could do this without you. But it would be really awkward.