Ethics in Design and Communication

This timely collection brings together critical, analytic, historical, and practical studies to address what ethics means in the practice of design.

Designers face the same challenges as everyone else in the complex conditions of contemporary cultural life—choices about consumption, waste, exploitation, ecological damage, and political problems built into the supply chains on which the global systems of inequity currently balance precariously. But designers face the additional dilemma that their paid work is often entangled with promoting the same systems such critical approaches seek to redress: how to reconcile this contradiction, among others, in seeking to chart an ethical course of action while still functioning effectively in the world.

Ethics in Design and Communication acknowledges the complexity of this subject matter, while also demonstrating that in the ongoing struggle towards an equitable and sustainable world, the talents of design and critical thought are essential. Featured case studies include graphic design internships today, the dark web, and media coverage of the 2016 US presidential election. The fact that within this book such a wide array of practitioners, scholars, critics, and professionals commit to addressing current injustices is already a positive sign. Nonetheless, it is essential that we guard against confusing the coercive force of moral imperatives with ethical deliberation when conceiving a foundation for action.

Laura Scherling Ed.D. is a designer, researcher, and author. She is a director and faculty at Columbia University, USA, and researches emerging technologies, design, media, and sustainability topics. She completed her doctorate at Columbia University Teachers College.

Andrew DeRosa is Assistant Professor of Design at Queens College, CUNY, USA, and Visiting Assistant Professor of Communications Design at the Pratt Institute, USA.