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Studio for Better Problems

From quick fixes to slow composition

The Studio for Better Problems is an open pedagogical format that articulates the description of socio-environmental and socio-technical issues with the generation of projects that address them.

Teaching

Problems are made and could be made otherwise

The team Collective Inquiries and Inventive Formats tackles the problematisation of social concerns about technology and the environment: what is deemed relevant in order to address a situation that needs to be changed ? And according to whom? Informed by theories and practices of design, our methodological approach consists in creating fieldwork devices to facilitate the engagement of multiple actors and provoke new, lively and daring descriptions of the problematic situations these actors participate in solving. In our projects we learn, as researchers, how the relevance, the significance, the shape of public issues that matter to society are made through a variety of practices, forms of expertise and modes of participation. In other words, an important lesson that we draw from our research is that problems are made and could be made otherwise. In the Studio for Better Problems, we apply this lesson to teaching and training situations that pertain to social change and innovation. 

Becoming students of problems

The Studio for Better Problems adapts our research methodology to pedagogical objectives of higher education and continuous training, in particular when students are invited to apply the knowledge produced by social sciences and humanities in order to effectuate social change, to innovate or to generate transformative projects. Many discourses and pedagogical approaches focus heavily on problem-solving and on the creativity, skills and resources that are mobilised in the resolution of problems. Design Thinking is one such methodological framework that has been promoted as a recipe for anyone to engage in creativity and problem-solving activities. On the contrary, we do not search for quick fixes but aim at the slow composition of problems. We believe that, in order to respond to complex socio-environmental and socio-technical  challenges, students also need imagination, skills, and patience to craft better problems.

The Studio builds on previous hands-on pedagogical exercizes that have been elaborated at the médialab, such as controversy mapping. However, whereas controversy mapping mobilized digital methods to “follow the actors” and collect existing voices participating in public issues, students of the Studio actively provoke the emergence of new voices. 

Composing better problems requires tools to navigate the different types of expertise, stemming from disciplinary background, epistemic authority, economic interests, social positions, or lived experience, that see issues differently. Following the example of conception practices, students start from their own personal sensibility to build artefacts, develop participatory formats and invent inquiry methods to become thoughtful, meticulous problem-composers. They learn to become students of problems, regardless of whether they officially hold the title of "student."

How to intervene in teaching and training situations ?

The Studio does not follow a fixed framework such as the double diamond model or Design Thinking processes. Instead, we prefer ad hoc and customized composition techniques. However there are a few common principles : 

  • paying attention to frictions and troubles in the course of everyday life,
  • inquiring into practices that blur the boundary between online and offline environments (also called postdigital),
  • crafting fieldwork devices to make sense of and sensitise oneself to issues,
  • caring for the publication and sharing formats of the outputs.