Talk given in Designing the Commons seminar, Loughborough University London

1. Protospace, Utrecht, the Netherlands
November 2014
photo Cindy Kohtala
COMMONING
CARE IN
GRASSROOTS
MAKER
COMMUNITIES
Dr Cindy Kohtala
Postdoctoral Researcher
Department of Design, Aalto University, Finland
DESIGNING THE COMMONS SEMINAR
Loughborough University London
26 November 2020

2. meta-design
commoning
infrastructuring
care
commons
participatory
justice
sustainability
care
democratizing
open

4. Camp Pixelache, Vartiosaari, Helsinki
June 2014
photo Cindy Kohtala
COMMONS
COMMONING
Ostrom 1990;
Bollier and Helfrich 2012

5. Kääntöpöytä urban greenhouse, Helsinki
April 2012
photo Cindy Kohtala
INFRASTRUCTURING
Karasti and Syränen 2004;
Björgvinsson, Ehn, and Hillgren
2012; Marttila and Botero 2016
COMMONS
COMMONING
Ostrom 1990;
Bollier and Helfrich 2012

6. FAB15, El Gouna, Egypt
July 2019
photo Cindy Kohtala
COMMONS
Ostrom 1990
THE NEW
COMMONS
Hess 2008
THE DIGITAL
COMMONS

7. hacker dome, Koppelting
‘The Great Gathering of
the Commons’ festival
Fablab Amersfoort
the Netherlands
August 2016
photo Cindy Kohtala
COMMONS-
BASED PEER
PRODUCTION
Benkler and
Nissenbaum 2006;
Seravalli 2014

8. Factory 2.0
DIY 2.0
Web 2.0
commons-
based
peer
production
material
digital
digital
manufacturing
distributed,
personal
distributed,
personalized
prosumption
distributed
hardware
distributed
software
Kohtala 2015

9. FabLab Amersfoort, the Netherlands
November 2014
photo Cindy Kohtala
COMMONS-
BASED PEER
PRODUCTION
Benkler and
Nissenbaum 2006;
Seravalli 2014
DESIGN-IN-USE
DESIGN-AFTER-DESIGN
META-DESIGN
Giaccardi and
Fischer 2008;
Menichinelli 2020
Redström 2008; Kohtala,
Hyysalo, and Whalen 2020;
Botero et al. 2020

10. Happihuone
urban activist greenhouse, Helsinki
August 2001
photo Cindy Kohtala
URBAN
COMMONS
CULTURAL
COMMONS
DIGITAL
COMMONS

11. Valldaura Self-Sufficiency Lab, Barcelona
August 2016
photo Cindy Kohtala
Formia 2017;
Borgonuovo and
Franceschini 2018
RADICAL
DESIGN
MOVEMENTSGlobal Tools
Autoprogettazione

15. Pixelache Festival: Interfaces for Empathy
Lapinlahti, Helsinki, Finland
September 2016
photo Cindy Kohtala

16. Open Source Beehives at Valldaura Green Fab Lab, Barcelona
July 2014
photo Cindy Kohtala
what is
designed?
objects...
OPEN DESIGN
van Abel et al.
2011; Bakırlıoğlu
and Kohtala 2019

17. Helsinki Hacklab
May 2015
photo Cindy Kohtala
what is
designed?
technologies...

18. experiment with
shredding waste
plastic and forming new
3D printing filament,
by Usinette
Made in Kallio, Helsinki
May 2013
photo Cindy Kohtala
what is
designed?
new materials
and
processes...

19. what is
designed?
new materials
and
processes...
Koppelting ‘The Great Gathering
of the Commons’ festival
Fablab Amersfoort
the Netherlands
August 2016
photo Cindy Kohtala
what is
designed?
new ways to
interact

20. what is
designed?
new ways to
self-organize
and self-govern
FAB14, Toulouse
July 2018
photo Cindy Kohtala

21. Kohtala, Hyysalo,
and Whalen 2020

22. Kohtala, Hyysalo,
and Whalen 2020

23. Koppelting ‘The Great Gathering
of the Commons’ festival
Fablab Amersfoort
the Netherlands
August 2016
photo Cindy Kohtala
VALUES-IN-
DESIGN
Flanagan, Howe, and
Nissenbaum 2008

24. Pixelache Festival 2011
Suomenlinna, Helsinki
photo Cindy Kohtala

25. Pixelache Festival
2011, Suomenlinna
photo Cindy Kohtala
www.makerbot.com

26. ease of use
amount
of control
based on a diagram by Risto Sarvas

27. Open Source Beehives at Valldaura Green Fab Lab, Barcelona
July 2014
photo Cindy Kohtala

28. https://www.osbeehives.com

29. https://inhabitat.com/philips-unveils-sexy-concept-bee-keeping-gadget/

31. Fellesverkstedet Fab Lab
Oslo, Norway
September 2017
photo Cindy Kohtala
Dunbar-Hester 2014
what is inherited?
previous work/
collaboration cultures

32. Aalto Fablab, Helsinki, Finland
May 2013
photo Cindy Kohtala
some open source software
communities are known for
bullying and misogyny
but codes of conduct are
often seen as censorship
and a breach of the ‘free
and open’ ethos
Nafus 2012; Kohtala,
Walls, and We-Left
Collective 2019

33. Kohtala, Walls, and We-
Left Collective 2019

34. Koppelting ‘The Great Gathering
of the Commons’ festival
Fablab Amersfoort
the Netherlands
August 2016
photo Cindy Kohtala
“Access to the urban commons is organized not only
via rights and laws, but also through what Sara Ahmed
calls ‘atmospheric walls,’ which although difficult to
grasp are techniques for ‘making spaces available to
some more than to others.’ Whiteness, masculinity, and
class privilege are good examples of immaterial walls
with material effects.”
Vrasti and Dayal
2016: 994

35. FabLab Breda, the Netherlands
November 2014
photo Cindy Kohtala
INCLUSION

36. Pixelache Festival: Interfaces for
Empathy, Lapinlahti, Helsinki, Finland
September 2016
photo Cindy Kohtala
platform cooperatives
distribute the care work:
co-governance
the promises of the
sharing economy

37. https://disco.coop

38. https://disco.coop
Based on seven non-prescriptive principles
(updated from the original cooperative principles),
DisCOs are:
Oriented towards social and environmental ends
Multi-constituent in nature
Active creators of commons
Transnational in nature
Centred on care work
Prototypes for new flows of values
Designed to be federated

39. what is
designed?
new materials
and
processes...
Precious Plastic
Eindhoven, the Netherlands
October 2018
photo Cindy Kohtala
de la Bellacasa 2010;
Toombs, Bardzell, and
Bardzell 2015; Kohtala,
Walls, and We-Left
Collective 2019
CARE
in our relations, for
materials, processes

40. Trashlab repair event
January 2014, Kaupunkiverstas
photo Cindy Kohtala
REPAIR
MAINTENANCE

41. Trashlab repair event
February 2016, Fine Arts Academy, Helsinki
photo Cindy Kohtala
collective agency and
shared responsibilities
literacies
care in repair and
maintenance

42. Espoo Mini Maker Faire, Finland
October 2015
photo Cindy Kohtala
COMMONS
Ostrom 1990
THE NEW
COMMONS
Hess 2008

43. Open Source Circular Economy (OSCE) Days Helsinki
June 2016, Kääntöpöytä
photo Cindy Kohtala
Fleischmann, Hielscher, and Merritt
2016; Prendeville et al. 2017;
Berglund and Kohtala 2020
what questions matter?
SUSTAINABILITY AND
ENVIRONMENTALISM

44. van Abel, Bas, Lucas Evers, Roel Klaassen, and Peter Troxler. 2011. Open Design Now: Why Design Cannot Remain Exclusive. Amsterdam, the Netherlands:
BIS Publishers.
Bakırlıoğlu, Yekta, and Cindy Kohtala. 2019. “Framing Open Design through Theoretical Concepts and Practical Applications: A Systematic Literature
Review.” Human-Computer Interaction 34 (5–6): 389–432.
de la Bellacasa, María Puig. 2010. “Matters of Care in Technoscience: Assembling Neglected Things.” Social Studies of Science 41 (1): 85–106.
Benkler, Yochai, and Helen Nissenbaum. 2006. “Commons-Based Peer Production and Virtue.” The Journal of Political Philosophy 14 (4): 394–419.
Berglund, Eeva, and Cindy Kohtala. 2020. “Collaborative Confusion among DIY Makers: Ethnography and Expertise in Creating Knowledge for
Environmental Sustainability.” Science & Technology Studies 33 (2): 102–119.
Björgvinsson, Erling, Pelle Ehn, and Per-Anders Hillgren. 2012. “Design Things and Design Thinking: Contemporary Participatory Design Challenges.” Design
Issues 28 (3): 101–116.
Bloemen, Sophie, and Thomas de Groot, eds. 2019. Our Commons: Political Ideas for a New Europe. Amsterdam, the Netherlands: Institute of Network
Cultures.
Bollier, David, and Helfrich, Silke. 2019. Free, fair and alive: The insurgent power of the commons. New Society Publishers.
Borgonuovo, Valerio, and Silvia Franceschini, eds. 2018. Global Tools 1973-1975: When Education Coincides with Life. Rome: Nero.
Botero, Andrea. 2013. “Expanding Design Space(s): Design in Communal Endeavours.” Doctoral Dissertation, Helsinki, Finland: Aalto University School of
Arts, Design and Architecture, Department of Media.
Botero, Andrea, Sampsa Hyysalo, Cindy Kohtala, and Jack Whalen. 2020. “Getting Participatory Design Done: From Methods and Choices to Translation
Work across Constituent Domains.” International Journal of Design 14 (2): 17–34.
Dunbar-Hester, Christina. 2014. “Radical Inclusion? Locating Accountability in Technical DIY.” In DIY Citizenship: Critical Making and Social Media, edited by
Matt Ratto and Megan Boler, 75–88. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.
Flanagan, Mary, Daniel C. Howe, and Helen Nissenbaum. 2008. “Embodying Values in Technology: Theory and Practice.” In Information Technology and
Moral Philosophy, edited by Jeroen van den Hoven and John Weckert, 322–353. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Fleischmann, Katja, Sabine Hielscher, and Timothy Merritt. 2016. “Making Things in Fab Labs: A Case Study on Sustainability and Co-Creation.” Digital
Creativity 27 (2): 113–131.
Formia, Elena. 2017. “Mediating an Ecological Awareness in Italy: Shared Visions of Sustainability Between the Environmental Movement and Radical Design
Cultures (1970–1976).” Journal of Design History 30 (2): 192–211.
Giaccardi, Elisa, and Gerhard Fischer. 2008. “Creativity and Evolution: A Metadesign Perspective.” Digital Creativity 19 (1): 19–32.
Hermans, Guido. 2015. “Opening Up Design: Engaging the Layperson in the Design of Everyday Products.” Doctoral Dissertation, Umeå, Sweden: Umeå
Institute of Design, Faculty of Science and Technology.
Hess, Charlotte. 2008. “Mapping the New Commons.” Working Paper. http://ssrn.com/abstract=1356835.
Hess, David J. 2016. Undone Science: Social Movements, Mobilized Publics, and Industrial Transitions. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.
Karasti, Helena, and Anna-Liisa Syränen. 2004. “Artful Infrastructuring in Two Cases of Community PD.” In Proceedings of the Eighth Conference on
Participatory Design: Artful Integration: Interweaving Media, Materials and Practices - Volume 1, 1:20–30. New York, NY: ACM.
Kelty, Christopher M. 2017. “Too Much Democracy in All the Wrong Places: Toward a Grammar of Participation.” Current Anthropology 58 (S15): S77–S90.
REFERENCES

45. REFERENCES
Kohtala, Cindy. 2018. “The Sociomateriality of FabLabs: Configurations of a Printing Service or Counter-Context?” Journal of Peer Production 12.
http://peerproduction.net/issues/issue-12-makerspaces-and-institutions/peer-reviewed-papers/the-sociomateriality-of-fablabs/.
Kohtala, Cindy. 2016. “Making Sustainability: How Fab Labs Address Environmental Issues.” Doctoral Dissertation, Helsinki, Finland: Aalto University School
of Arts, Design and Architecture, Department of Design.
Kohtala, Cindy. 2015. “Addressing Sustainability in Research on Distributed Production: An Integrated Literature Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106:
654–668.
Kohtala, Cindy, Sampsa Hyysalo, and Jack Whalen. 2020. “A Taxonomy of Users’ Active Design Engagement in the 21st Century.” Design Studies 67: 27–54.
Kohtala, Cindy, Jedediah Walls, and We-Left Collective. 2019. “Designing Care and Commoning into a Code of Conduct.” In Proceedings of NORDES 2019
Nordic Design Research Society Conference, No 8:1–5. Espoo, Finland: Nordic Design Research Society.
https://archive.nordes.org/index.php/n13/article/view/475.
Manzini, Ezio. 2015. Design, When Everybody Designs: An Introduction to Design for Social Innovation. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.
Marttila, Sanna. 2018. “Infrastructuring for Cultural Commons.” Doctoral Dissertation 1/2018, Helsinki, Finland: Aalto University School of Arts, Design and
Architecture, Department of Media.
Marttila, Sanna, and Andrea Botero. 2016. “Bees, Drones and Other Things in Public Space: Strategizing in the City.” Strategic Design Research Journal 9 (2):
75–88.
Menichinelli, Massimo. 2020. “Open and Collaborative Design Processes: Meta-Design, Ontologies and Platforms within the Maker Movement.” Doctoral
Dissertation, Helsinki, Finland: Aalto University School of Arts, Design and Architecture, Department of Media.
Nafus, Dawn. 2012. “‘Patches Don’t Have Gender’: What Is Not Open in Open Source Software.” New Media & Society 14 (4): 669–683.
Ostrom, Elinor. 1990. Governing the Commons: The Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Prendeville, Sharon, Grit Hartung, Clare Brass, Erica Purvis, and Ashley Hall. 2017. “Circular Makerspaces: The Founder’s View.” International Journal of
Sustainable Engineering 10 (4–5): 272–288.
Redström, Johan. 2008. “RE:Definitions of Use.” Design Studies 29 (4): 410–423.
Seravalli, Anna. 2014. “Making Commons: Attempts at Composing Prospects in the Opening of Production.” Doctoral Dissertation, Malmö, Sweden: Malmö
University.
Toombs, Austin, Shaowen Bardzell, and Jeffrey Bardzell. 2015. “The Proper Care and Feeding of Hackerspaces: Care Ethics and Cultures of Making.” In
Proceedings of the 33rd Annual ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 629–638. New York: ACM.
Vrasti, Wanda, and Smaran Dayal. 2016. “Cityzenship: Rightful Presence and the Urban Commons.” Citizenship Studies 20 (8).

46. cindy.kohtala@aalto.fi
@ckohtala
ckohtala@social.coop
Open Source Circular Economy Days Helsinki 2017
June 2017, Teurastamo, Helsinki
photo Cindy Kohtala