Seeking to explore the socio-technical view on infrastructure, we look at the design process of water sensitive cities infrastructure in six informal settlements in Makassar, Indonesia.
Part 1
A photo-diary of Makassar is a glimpse into a formal and informal city that lies on a swampy estuary. From here, step intokampungs, places rich with life that rapidly change. Then, it is time to hear astoryof7toilets, as an introduction of a design problem: water entanglements.
Part 2 The design process that is focused on complex things and relations is notonly about thetoolsfordesigning. Designers, panritas, are getting lost and found inside the maze of perspectives. We should explore things that are not usually told: the making and humming.
Part 3
If the water sensitive infrastructure is to be integrated in many futures, it needs to start communicating. Hereis a
wetland that tells about her journey.
This website is one of the outcomes of the doctoral research “Entangled
with Water: Participation and design of water and sanitation
infrastructure in Indonesia”.
Abstract
This research operates at the intersection of three
domains: informal settlements, water infrastructure, and participatory design.
These domains are connected by the wicked problem of how to design and deliver
health and environmental improvements for the one billion people living in
informal settlements. How can participatory methods meaningfully engage people
and things to facilitate systemic change? Embedded within the Revitalising
Informal Settlements and their Environments (RISE) program, this research
explores the tensions and contradictions of how water sensitive cities design
and technologies, widely implemented in the Global North, can be designed for
informal settlement environments of the Global South. The case study research
uses ethnographic and design research methods to empirically document and
analyse how a decentralised, water and sanitation infrastructure has been
designed in six informal settlements in Makassar, Indonesia. The research
findings: (i) reveal a set of practical opportunities and barriers for
integrating water sensitive urban design in Indonesian informal settlements;
(ii) highlight the potential of architects and designers in addressing systemic
sustainability challenges, and (iii) illustrate the benefit of design
epistemology that integrates the socio-technical, human and non-human worlds.
The study contributes to the emerging body of research on the value of a
phenomenological view of participatory design practice.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.