Designing Dissensual Common Sense : Critical Art, Architecture, and Design in Jacques Rancière’s Political Thought

Abstract

How can design be socially engaged and politically efficient, as proposed by discourses labeled as critical design? This article introduces a conceptualization and historiography of politically charged design discourse based on philosopher Jacques Rancière’s work on the intersections of politics, aesthetics, and critical artistic practices. By focusing especially on Rancière’s reading of the genealogy of design from Ruskin to constructivism and the Bauhaus, the article aims to show that there is an important connection between design and politics present in Rancière’s thought. Rather than solely revealing the oppressive dimension embedded in designed forms, for Rancière, design is itself a profound process of aesthetical and sensorial reconfiguration of the way in which we perceive and articulate our communal existence in “the shared material world.” The article suggests that this connection is useful for examining the broader encounter of critical design with political theory.