My last interview with Dinda and Isra from Kampung Kollektief eventually led me to Karasa BDG, a creative collective borned in the alleyways of Gempolsari, Bandung, West Java. From their reference, I arranged an online interview in July 2025 with Abdul Qodir—or Kang Qodir—the founder and creative director of Karasa BDG. We discussed his vision and works: how graphic design could transform not just individual lives, but an entire kampung. His thoughts on enabling emergent strategy through design education for youth fascinated me. Could graphic design truly become an urban design strategy—one powerful enough to spark a grassroots movement?
Before we ended the online meeting, I asked whether I could visit Gempolsari once I returned to Indonesia.
“Yeah! Of course, you are welcome! We’ll have some members of Karasa to show you around,” he replied warmly. “We always love having people. All researchers, academicians, we love to have let them learn from our village.”
And so, I did.
The Arrival in Gempolsari
After completing my third intervention in Cipadu, I took the fast train from Jakarta to Bandung the following week. The contrast was striking: intercity transport had become so advanced between the two metropolitan hubs, yet both Cipadu and Gempolsari still wrestled with the same umbrella problem—socio-ecological challenges—though they advanced in different ways. Even amidst technological progress, the social transitions in these kampungs often remained hindered.
The train pulled into Bandung in just under an hour. Kang Qodir had a meeting later that day, so I headed straight for Gempolsari. The road narrowed after several intersections, leading me into the dense alleyways typical of urban kampungs. Yet one thing immediately stood out: Gempolsari was cleaner and livelier, with colorful murals brightening nearly every block.
Following Kang Qodir’s text, I asked locals where the head of the RW (Rukun Warga or District) lived. Everyone seemed to know exactly where to direct me. A lady pointed me toward a corner house, Kang Qodir’s house. Clearly, he was a familiar figure in this neighbourhood.
I didn’t even need to knock. As I greeted him with a Salaam, he was already waiting by the open door, smiling. “Welcome!” he said, radiating warmth. Beside him stood a young man. “This is Wendi, one of Karasa’s members. He’ll show you around.”
Before heading out, we sat together in conversation. Kang Qodir explained how his home also doubled as a drawing course for children and a gathering spot for Karasa members. His openness was striking, it felt less like I was being welcomed not as a guest, and more like I was being invited in as a student eager to learn.
How It All Began
Wendi began our tour with the story of how Karasa BDG started. Kang Qodir, once insecure about living in Gempolsari—then notorious for youth gangs and crime—decided to paint the kampung’s gapura (entrance gate). Kids quickly gathered around, joining him with brushes in hand. That small act grew into regular drawing classes.
“He realized the kids loved it,” Wendi said, pointing to the now-iconic gapura where it all began. “So he started teaching drawing, and later, graphic design.”
From this story, it became clear: Kang Qodir wasn’t just an artist. He was a community leader with contagious energy, someone who turned vulnerability into possibility. Like a dandelion spreading seeds, he planted positivity that began to take root across the kampung (Brown, 2017).
Aruaksa Festival
Wendi then recounted their September 2025 festival, “Aruaksa,” initiated by Karasa BDG’s youth members. “It started as a graduation project,” he said. “We didn’t just want classes, we wanted to showcase what we had learned.”
The festival became more than an exhibition. It redefined what was “cool” for Gempolsari’s youth. Rather than gangs, fights, or risky behaviour, creativity became the badge of pride. Through drawing and design, Kang Qodir created not just skills, but new behaviours—redirecting youthful energy toward collective pride and social good.
And because Bandung was under a “waste emergency,” the festival also wove in sustainability themes, linking art with environmental responsibility.
BrandGang: Reclaiming the Alleys
One of Karasa BDG’s boldest initiatives was “BrandGang” a play on words rebranding the narrow alleys (gang) by transforming them into communal, creative spaces. Originally, these branhang/brandgang—a Dutch term referring to small back alleys or emergency exit passageways designed during the Dutch colonial era—had been neglected or misused as dumping sites or even privatized by residents. Over time, what was once a functional urban feature had become a source of environmental and social problems.
Karasa reimagined these spaces as vibrant canvases. The approach was simple yet powerful: invite both expert designers and community members to collaborate. Almost 60 volunteers showed up, not for pay, but for purpose. They used recycled materials, local creativity, and most importantly, people’s willingness to contribute.
The results were striking: eleven alleyways transformed into colorful public spaces. Crime rates dropped, neighbors became more mindful of waste, and a stronger sense of gotong royong emerged. While not everyone agreed, some resisted having their houses painted—the growing solidarity helped Karasa navigate conflicts, persuading even skeptics over time.
Eventually, even the local government took notice, funding more pedestrian projects and inviting tourism into Gempolsari. Pride in the kampung soared.
Lessons and Limitations
Back at his house, I asked Kang Qodir the inevitable question:
“How did you do it?”
He laughed. “It doesn’t happen overnight. And never underestimate the power of youth, they are the ones who move the community.”
But youth empowerment also has its limits. As young members grow older and pursue careers, they may leave. To address this, Karasa continues to recruit younger generations through art, sports, and play, while encouraging older members to mentor the new. The challenge now lies in sustaining leadership beyond Kang Qodir himself, nurturing more local leaders who can carry the same spirit forward.
Cipadu and Gempolsari: Twin Sisters Separated by a Train
Both Cipadu and Gempolsari face deep socio-ecological challenges, but their trajectories differ. In Jakarta’s kampungs like Cipadu, systemic barriers—thuggery, bureaucratic hurdles, and fragmented leadership—often block grassroots initiatives. In Gempolsari, the relative absence of such pressures allowed Karasa’s vision to flourish more smoothly.
The contrast is revealing. Empowerment is not just about skills—it’s about agency. In Gempolsari, co-design and shared decision-making gave residents ownership. In Cipadu, by contrast, many residents assumed someone else would clean their rubbish, reflecting a learned dependency rather than collective responsibility.
Comparative Study
Berimajinaria x Cipadu
Gempolsari x KarasaBDG
Creativity as community empowerment is a novice practice.
Gempolsari has been building creative village since 2017.
The local authorities or government officers still using top-down approach, and seeing the creative workers as their vendors/partners.
Involving creative workers as part of government practitioners; proven by Kang Qodir appeared as Community Chairman with his background as Creative Director.
Cipadu is still in discovery part, has not yet found the real creative practice.
Has built their own community’s project plan for the future.
Conclusion
Kang Qodir is living proof that positivity can ripple outward, transforming not just individuals, but entire communities.
“His energy makes us move,” Wendi told me as we walked. “Kang Qodir is never tired.”
Everything we touch, touches us back. Through Karasa BDG, kindness itself has been designed into a form of creative empowerment. And perhaps, just perhaps, that is the new cool.
After nine months miles away from home, I finally come back home. But this time, not as a local, but as a visitor. With the eyes of both a stranger and a researcher, the familiar suddenly feels unfamiliar. What once seemed ordinary and normal, now reveals its weight, its fractures, its hidden power. Paradoxically, distance makes me feel closer, more empowered to question and empathize what I once accepted as “normal.”
The people of Cipadu welcomed me with open hands, seeing my presence as a chance to make a ripple. Like many marginalized communities, they often look for a saviour. But I reminded them, I am not here to save, but to spark possibilities, to help them find power within themselves. Making emergent strategy possible by involving learning from the patterns and systems of the natural world to build adaptive and relational ways of being (Brown, 2017).
This makes me wonder about the weight of socio-ecological pressure they were facing until they were so desperate for immediate change.
The Preparation
I spent hours with fellow Indonesian designers, who were interested to collaborate in my third intervention, shaping a simple way to turn people’s imagination into usable social data. While we were still wrestling with a co-design method, I received a reply from Lucy Kimbell, Professor of Contemporary Design Practices at Central Saint Martins, to my earlier email on Social Design.
She shared a bunch of resources on design for transitions, including ‘Thinking while drawing and drawing to think: Exploring reflective doodling as a critical reflective practice in design for transitions.’ (Wallace, 2020) which sparks a new idea for the co-design method.
Image 2: Intervention 3 Plan
In this journal, the writer discusses how reflective doodling can be a unique form of thinking-drawing helps designers process complex theoretical knowledge to unpack wicked and sociotechnical problems. Drawing or doodling can be the easiest medium for co-creation between diffuse designer (the people) and expert designers, that could lead to emerging innovation (Manzini, 2015). Thus, it made me and my fellow designers come up with the idea of cross-collaboration co-design hackathon, through reflective drawing.
“Draw, Play, Reflect” Implementation
Image 3: Reflective Drawing Implementation
In this intervention, researchers and designers stepped into the role of story facilitators instead of heroes. By engaging with residents’ lived experiences, we gathered fragments of their aspirations and transformed them into visual narratives on postcards. Inspired by the idea of penpals, each postcard became a vessel for heartfelt expression, allowing people to pour their emotions into drawings.
The session was designed to move away from the typical top-down “magic touch” solutions of local authorities, but rather amplifying community voices through creative translation and uncovering their potential. The task was simple: imagining your vision of a dream home, public space, or community in Kampung or Village of Cipadu. Residents could either sketch freely on a blank A6 postcard or overlay their reflections onto curated photographs that illustrated pressing issues from the first intervention; flooding, waste, public space, and the state of gotong royong. .
Participants ranged from children to older generations, with sessions held across two days. The first day was dedicated to adults, who tended to be more reflective, grounding their drawings in both discovery and personal memory. Many linked their ideas to lived experiences from the past, enabling us to uncover deeper insights into the root causes of the challenges faced by the community.
The second day was dedicated to children, the very generation that many participants in the previous intervention had expressed concern about. For the children, the session felt more like a drawing and play activity rather than a co-design process, which was completely fine, since the aim was to capture their perspectives on the neighbourhood rather than formal aspirations. Children naturally tended to draw familiar and simple things, such as mountains, houses, or objects from their daily surroundings.
As anticipated, the drawing-on-postcard activity was seamless and easy to engage with. With encouragement and affirmation throughout the drawing process, participants became more confident in their art, and many ended up creating more than one postcard to reflect on the multiple challenges they face in their neighbourhood. It was heartwarming to witness participants sharing their reflections not only with their neighbours, but also with the local authorities who joined the session.
Participants also seemed more motivated once they learned that their drawings would be exhibited in London as part of further research. To make the process more enjoyable, snacks and drawing tools were provided so that participants could focus entirely on expressing their ideas. Interestingly, some children even brought their own drawing tools, making them more comfortable with the activity.
The Unexpected Outcome
Image 4: The Reflective Drawing Postcards Compilation
In total, more than 90 postcards were collected from both children and adults. About 70 participants preferred to draw on blank postcards, allowing themselves greater freedom to express radical and imaginative ideas. Meanwhile, around 20 chose to draw on photographic overlays, giving them a more direct way to respond to specific issues.
Image 5: A Girl Draw Her Dream to Live Far Away from Flood
As expected, flooding emerged as the community’s main concern. However, the personal stories and underlying causes revealed through the drawings were deeply unexpected, uncovering new dimensions of the problems, such as:
“I need to move my motorcycle to higher ground whenever heavy rain comes. I’m so afraid the flood will sink it,” one young lady explained.
“Since Covid-19, my house has sunk further with every flood. It’s so hard for me to get out,” said an old lady who lives nearby.
“What can I do? I can’t move. No one will buy my house like this. My family and I just have to live with it.”
“I wish I could move the entire neighbourhood to the mountains, so we’d be safe from floods.” A kid said cheerfully.
“Some of my friends have quitted gambling. I am both sad to lose the fun with them, but I am happy that they are doing better than we were. Stop gambling!”
“How I wish I had a mansion, maybe I would never experience anymore” a little girl said.
and so on!
Image 6: Aftermath Waste
These reflections pierced my heart. Instead of hope, many participants expressed resignation—having endured these struggles for so long, they have tried simply to cope. This resignation has, in turn, led some to neglect their environment, as simple as not carrying their rubbish after the session even though we provide it with a nearby bin, and having some people to clean up for the event. Albeit, most of their drawings clearly showed a longing for a greener, better neighbourhood. They still have dreams and ideas for an improved future, but the surrounding systems do not support those visions.
On the other hand, is the resignation is purely because of the people fault? Or is this the systemic issue that normalise the digression behaviour that occurs for a long time?
The Paradox of The Wicked Problems
Image 7: Previous Interventions Addressed Issues
When we first did the intervention online, we thought the environment and social issues are the main problems, but on the second to the third it reveals more complex problems that intertwined.
Image 8: A Remaining Water Tank with a Sign Written “My City Program: No Slum City” On Top of Piles of Bins
To some extent, their socio-ecological challenges are deeply intertwined with sociotechnical issues, particularly economic education barriers. In terms of economic issue, for example, on the first day of the workshop, my partner noticed a water tank engraved with the slogan “No Slum City”, standing in sharp irony amid a neighbourhood marked by slum conditions and unpleasant odours. When I asked local authorities about it, one explained that the state government had indeed launched a slum-upgrading program a couple years ago, allocating £44,600 for improvements in the urban village. “However,” she admitted, “the person in charge took the majority of the funds, leaving us with nothing but the water tank for a clean water station.”
This statement shook me. That amount of funding could have significantly improved the entire village, yet it was robbed away. It was no wonder that residents felt hopeless, not only battling flooding but also local thuggery (premanisme), a predatory saviourism that eroded trust and robbed them of change.
Image 9: A Young Boy Imagining A Corrupt-free City in 10 Years
Another proof of subtle local thuggery or premanisme or vrijman-ism is shown from the some local authorities in Cipadu who requested us, the researchers, to at least give the second session participants some kind of. “door prizes” or “souvenirs” in order for people to be more encouraged to come. I realized there was my fault involved in this communication, because I might not clearly addressed the invitation as a research process, therefore, many of them saw this as a drawing contest which they have known will have a reward in it.
The rewarding system in the whole process should be further study among the people. Do pressing situations or economic challenges play a role in people’s eagerness to participate? Or is it the power dynamics at play, where the involvement of local authorities creates intentional interests that shape how this research is received?
I believe that inaccessible education also plays a role in shaping the neighbourhood. Some residents endure and normalise digressive behaviours, partly due to the lack of access to education. Beyond the absence of higher education institutions, there is also a shortage of both formal and informal early childhood education.
“We often have tactical workshops whenever development program funding is allocated from the top down,” the local authority representative explained, “but they are never sustainable.”
Educational programs in the village are often created to serve government interests—such as digital marketing or barista training courses—rather than addressing the actual needs of Cipadu residents. This reveals how even education becomes corrupted, stripped of its role in giving people agency to contextualize and address the real problems in their own neighborhood.
Image 10: A Gentleman Design A Water Flow Solution to Stop Flooding
With education, empowered people can empower others, if their ideas are genuinely heard and captured. Education also liberates individuals from habits that perpetuate inequity (Anaissie, Cary, Clifford, Malarkey, & Wise, 2021). In the residents’ drawings, 13% portrayed emergent ideas on how to improve their village, most prominently around flood, waste and social solutions.
Image 11: A Gentleman Shared His Community Experience in Gambling
This is a clear signal: those with lived experience, keen observation, and contextual knowledge already carry the capacity to reimagine and redesign their neighbourhood. These are the people who understand their community best—and they deserve to be better facilitated.
Image 12: Session 2 Intervention with Children
With education, we are also seeding the younger generation to become the agent of change, by simply liberating themselves with curiosity and capability in observing their surrounding.
Image 13: Youth Inspired Youth Shown in The Artwork They Made
Conclusion: Untied The Tangled Ties
Going home is indeed both good and bad idea.
Bad because 19 hours of flight back and forth, and 10 days or relay race of doing the research is very TIRING and COMPACT. Blame on the peak season during July and August.
Had to do the research for 2 days in Cipadu, Tangerang, Banten, and doing observation on successful creative urban villages in Gempolsari, Bandung, West Java with Karasa BDG collective (which I will report it too on the next post.)
Good because now the research led us into something, unlocking many, many confusion that I could not be able to understand when I just did them online.
Image 14: A Young Man Shared His Thought on How To Stop Waste in The Sewers
Ultimately, this co-design hackathon in a form of reflective drawing reveals the wicked nature of the problems in Cipadu: flooding is not just an environmental issue, but a symptom of intertwined socio-technical failures.
This intervention highlights both the power and the paradox of community-led imagination in contexts of systemic neglect. On the surface, reflective drawing appeared to provide a liberating platform, because residents of Cipadu can finally voiced their frustrations, hopes, and visions through postcards that bridged generational perspectives.
Yet, beneath this creativity lies a sobering reality: their aspirations are repeatedly undermined by structural inequities, corrupted governance, and fragile socio-ecological systems.
The findings reveal that what often appears as “resignation” or “ignorance” among residents is not simply a matter of apathy or individual fault, but rather the internalization of systemic failure. It is proven from poor governance and inaccessible education, that makes the community’s voices rarely translate into tangible change.
Therefore, the systemic socio-ecological issue that has been addressed on the first and the second intervention is expanded beyond what lies on the surface and on the surface. There are bigger problems which can be drawn into multi layer perspective (MLP) from regime tier – economic to education challenges – to landscape tier – political interest. MLP is used to understand which part of the system action is taking place in the overall system of the neighbourhood.
Image 15: People are Engaged in Sharing Their Aspiration
The tension between participation and expectation also surfaces sharply. The request for door prizes or rewards reflects not only miscommunication, but also a deeper conditioning in which external interventions are transactional rather than transformational. Not to mention on how they want this research created immediate change in the near future.
Education emerges as both a missing infrastructure and a latent opportunity. When educational initiatives are designed around government or market agendas, they fail to cultivate agency or contextual problem-solving. But when people are given space to think, draw, and reflect, even in small ways, the seeds of localized solutions begin to surface.
This exposes a critical dilemma in participatory research: can communities genuinely engage in co-design when historical encounters with “development” have often reduced them to passive recipients of aid, rather than active agents of change?
Can people actually inspire people if we elevate Gotong Royong as the design for transtion?
All in all, this collection of reflective drawings serves as a valuable asset or lumbung (inspired by Documenta Fifteen) and a source of inspiration for the further development of Cipadu village. It also serves as a stepping stone in mapping out the priority issues when the government or residents plan to create a program in their village.
Wallace, N. (2020) “Thinking while drawing and drawing to think: Exploring ‘reflective doodling’ as a critical reflective practice in design for transitions.,” in. DRS2020: Synergy. Available at: https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2020.187.
Manzini, E. (2015) Design, when everybody designs: an introduction to design for social innovation. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press (Design thinking, design theory).
Last week, while tidying up my room, I found out that I have two series of Documenta that I haven’t finished reading yet. One of them is Documenta Fourteen, which I borrowed from Rahul Patel, and the other is Documenta Fifteen, which I borrowed from the library.
And I thought, oops..
And yeah, I began to read them again, so that I can return the Documenta Fourteen to Rahul before summer ends. I still keep the Documenta Fifteen once my project ends, I will tell you why later (p.s thank you to the magnificent CSM Library!)
Sasha-Come-Lately
I learned about Documenta after having separate discussions with Roger Orwell and Rahul Patel before the summer. When I asked about my initial research question about collective creativity, they both told me that RuangRupa, an Indonesian art collective based in Jakarta, was leading the art direction for Documenta Fifteen in Kassel, Germany in 2022.
The first thing that came up into my mind was: “What? I never knew that RuangRupa had an event in Kassel, Germany. How did I miss it?“
To catch up on the event information, I discussed it further in June 2025 with both of them. Apparently, both of them had attended Documenta Fifteen in 2022. From the discussion, I was advised to read the documentation for Documenta Fifteen first, along with the documentation for Documenta Fourteen, which I had borrowed from Rahul.
And thanks to Rahul, he gave me a full lecture about Documenta, after I gave back his book in August 2025. And from the discussion, it gave me a lot of ideas to shape my third intervention!
Source: Documenta Fifteen
To give you a context about this event in case you did not know either, just like me, Documenta is one of the world’s most significant and influential exhibitions of contemporary art, held every five years in the city of Kassel, Germany. It was an anchor of modern art post-world war 2. Documenta was founded in 1955 by Arnold Bode, a Kassel-based artist. The exhibition’s primary purpose was to reconnect Germany with the international art scene and to showcase works that had been deemed “degenerate art”, or discontinued art, and suppressed by the Nazi regime.
Every 5 years, the theme is changing, directed by different artists across the globe, to curate and collaborate with various artists from every part of the world. Including RuangRupa in Documenta Fifteen.
So the history of Documenta itself has been very political since the beginning. So, I GUESS I understand why Documenta Fifteen, was not really loud in my country back then.
So, I Read Them (Again) ✌️
When I first read the Documenta Fourteen, I was really confused about all the context at first. I need to read and re-read again. The art description and the essays are way too contemporary, and extremely confusing for me. I think that’s the reason why I was not really engaged at first.
But then I grabbed a coffee, lock myself in and read in a very comfortable setting. And finally I understood the underlying meaning behind the theme of “Learning from Athens.” Inspired from what was happening with Greece’s economy back in 2017, the theme was a radical and physical reorientation of the entire exhibition. For the first time in its history, Documenta was split between its traditional home in Kassel, Germany, and a second, equally important host city: Athens, Greece.
Most of the arts capturing various artists from all over the hemisphere in international level. There is one quote from Marina Fokidis, an art curator in Documenta Fourteen, from this video that stating a very important fact: “Documenta can not change economic crisis, but can give a hope through artistic scene.”
Art however, can both be right and left. And also can be very neutral. But art, in my opinion, can echo our voices. So it is our choice to choose what kind of voice we want to deliver.
Documenta Fourteen skillfully mirrored the dialogue between the “North” (Germany, perceived as the economic powerhouse) and the “South” (Greece, grappling with austerity and a refugee crisis). The central theme was a form of self-critique, encouraging a contemplation of the power dynamics within Europe and the global art world.
Contemporary arts, personally, can be very confusing to be casually read. I need to watch videos and even
So how about Documenta Fifteen?
When I first acknowledge Documenta Fifteen, I feel surprised to hear my own mother tongue term captured in a European book, which is “Lumbung”.
“Lumbung,” an Indonesian term for a communal rice barn, exemplifies a traditional system where villages collectively store surplus rice for the benefit of the entire community, especially during times of need. Ruangrupa applied this concept to the exhibition itself. They envisioned Documenta Fifteen as a “resource pot” that would be built and shared by a network of community-oriented art collectives and organizations from around the world, particularly from the Global South. So instead of they act as a curator, they want people to collaborate while they are facilitating the “resource pot”.
This theme was also influenced by the spirit of Gotong Royong, which emphasizes mutual cooperation and collaboration among all parties to overcome any challenges. RuangRupa identified this as a distinctive feature of the life of the people of the archipelago, or Indonesia.
Through this provocative, collaborative act of contemporary art, they shared stories and opened up conversations with people from another country who were experiencing the same problem that was depicted in the art at the events. Muhammad “Ucup” Yusuf, an artist from Taring Padi, said he was surprised that the problems that are happening in the developing countries is also happening in the developed countries after many conversations unlocked from the arts that are being exhibited.
HOWEVER, Documenta Fifteen apparently bring a lot of controversy. The collective was accused of anti-semitism because of a particular set of pictures that were put up. This issue was reportedly “blown all out of proportion” by other political forces.
In my opinion, it is because the topic highlighted the social and political issues all over the world, and through arts we are allowed to justify, criticize and make a stand over anything that we stood for. Just like the spirit of contemporary art and Kassel itself.
Although challenging, this endeavour opens up new horizons and knowledge for fellow artists, particularly Indonesians, towards diverse perspectives in the world. Apparently, due to the scandalous artworks, the artist was accused of lacking knowledge about antisemitism.
On the other hand, I don’t believe it’s about Indonesians not being knowledgeable about antisemitism. Some knowledge might not be being properly researched, or perhaps some people have more power to control conversations.
Isn’t art supposed to take a stand and provoke something?
Lesson from Documenta
Regardless of the wonders and controversies happening in Documenta Fifteen, we can learn that art collaboration can unlock various conversations through artworks or in, an MA Applied Imagination way, called artefact.
So, what if instead of serving as a platform for exhibiting artworks by various artists, a biennale could also be an entire design process that unlocks new discoveries? In this way, a biennale could become an institution and academic resource for artists and designers to gather, learn, and collaborate to solve complex problems.
Rahul also suggested this idea when I shared my plan for my third intervention. He guided me to the exhibition space near the library, explaining how the wall could serve as an entire design process for people to walk by, creating art or sharing their ideas collectively. Which I thought this could be a great idea to iterate my previous ideation session that I did from the second intervention.
The concept of Gotong Royong, as explored in RuangRupa, further solidified my research and led me towards this philosophy. This grassroots spirit has the potential to be integrated into existing designs as a social innovation method that is currently lacking in the Southern Hemisphere context. In my project, I aim to maximize the involvement of local residents in initiating and ideating their own neighbourhood.
Does it mean that I’m going to make a biennale?
Of course not yet, but maybe redefining the purpose of exhibition as a design method using gotong royong philosophy sounds better. Because, the research should make people feel included and not judged, therefore, diffuse arts or designs are welcome. And exhibition can be a great method for people to showcase their opinion and make it heard.
Although it was rough and made me got out of my comfort zone (initiating an event, gathering people around, SCARY). But apparently, I did??
But beforehand, why zine-making all of a sudden?
This is not all of a sudden, anyway.
Publication is one of the methods to communicate our ideas and thought, and zine is one of the possibilities of capturing creativity and human experience through a visual ethnography approach (Biagioli, Pässilä, and Owens, 2021).
Historically, zines operate at the intersection of art and activism, spanning the spectrum of social justice issues such as ecology, tenant’s rights, disability and political activism (Biagioli, Pässilä, and Owens, 2021). Oftentimes, zines are typically created with affordable, everyday materials and rely on simple, low-skill techniques like cutting, pasting, scribbling, and drawing, making zines highly accessible to made by anyone. Aligned with the values of sustainability, this session encourages participants to repurpose waste or scraps from their surroundings as the primary materials for their zines.
I adapted this method because I was inspired by Karasa BDG’s approach to prioritizing efficiency by utilizing minimal resources to maximize the utilization of available materials within their neighbourhood. And also when I attend a Pulp-Fiction workshop last month. These experience inspired me to use zine as a research method which also aims to challenge Indonesian willingness to take action on their waste materials into a new product or an art form like zine.
Within this research, zine-making is positioned as a participatory or co-design method, serving as a tangible medium for collective imagination to be articulated through the format of research publication.
How did the session plan out?
On my second intervention, I tested my method for facilitating complex conversations in the urban village, specifically about the future of our neighbourhood. I used the same strategy: discovering our memories about the neighbourhood through our five senses, analysing the STEEP priorities that urgently need to be addressed, and sharing our dreams and hopes. This time, I added an extra tangible activity for the reflection session: zine-making.
As mentioned on the image above, the zine-making event was held on August 16, 2025, at Regent’s Park in London. This activity was a collaborative effort between @LondonBergerak, an Indonesian activist group based in London, and my platform @berimajinaria, a collective movement (in the making) for building utopia through collective imagination.
I am utilising the magic of social media to create a hybrid platform that can engage both Indonesian communities online and offline. This inspiration came from an alumni’s night session, which I regrettably missed because I was away for 3DaysOfDesign in June 2025. (Thanks Meaghan for your help in gathering my feedbacks from the alumni, I love you tons!)
The purpose of the event was to invite Indonesian diaspora residing in London to attend and engage in a discussion about their future neighbourhood in Indonesia. I had sent out WhatsApp messages to every Indonesian in the UK’s WhatsApp groups, but only five people accepted and attended the zine-making event. Most of them were students pursuing their master’s degrees.
One of the reasons that I heard from my friends is because most of the students are currently on submission week or went out for summer trip, thus, not many people were coming to my session. Which is actually fine, because at the end we had a quality conversation and more in-depth knowledge exchange.
Although, most of them are my friends who I have known before :]. (Thank you guys, I owe you a lot!)
So, who are the participants?
Tadaa! These are the changemakers, artists, and students who have visions for the future of their homes. Among 6 registrants on the form, only 5 people showed up, and among five of them are two members of @LondonBergerak.
But these are the summary of their background:
Most of them fall under the age categories of 18 to 25 and 26 to 30 years old.
All of them are currently residing in London, UK.
They all lived (or currently living) in Indonesia, either in residential areas, urban kampung areas, or housing complexes.
The various background built some diversity in the perspectives on how to cultivate their neighbourhood. Making thinking throung design (in this context is zine) richer and unveil new possibilites.
On the initial discovery questions, I also asked what are the most valuable elements in a neighbourhood. And their top choices are including mobility, community, safety and security, affordable housing and flood free environment.
From these initial questions, I recognize that most of the youth are genuinely concerned about social and environmental factors, beyond economy, education, and politics when it comes to the factors that make up a neighbourhood. Reflecting to the first intervention with Cipadu citizens, they placed economic factor as equal as social factor.
In subsequence to this, the session in the park will justify this deduction from fragmented information and data gathered from the first intervention and zine-making form.
How was the session facilitated?
Before the session, I planned a step-by-step of the discussion in order to get a qualitative research from this session.
The planned was not like this before, I need to iterate from my previous framework in order to make more sense and create a seamless journey within 3 hours session. Thus, I adapted the exact questions I asked during my first intervention with Cipadu citizens.
Inspired by the power of ‘gotong royong’, this activity requires group discussion and collaboration, albeit the zine making are created by the participants themselves.
So here is how the process of zine-making session slash roundtable session was carried out:
Discovery Session
The discovery was divided into two pages because we printed the framework on A3 papers, necessitating the use of two pages for five participants.
From the “Five Senses” discovery, participants expressed a deep connection to nature, open fields, and communal life. These experiences evoke feelings of calmness, security, and connection, which are strengthened by the realization of the community’s presence, helping to combat feelings of loneliness. Participants enjoy the sounds of nature such as birds, children playing, and the presence of local traders that reinforce togetherness.
However, they are disturbed by urban pressures such as gentrification, vehicle noise, crime, insecurity, street thugs, mobility and environmental problems like flooding and lack of green space. A funny story about flooding, some people found flooding like a blessing when they were a child. This mindset expires as they grew older and realised that flooding is actually a disaster. Physical discomforts like heat and unsafe spaces also reduce their sense of belonging, this is an implication of climate change that currently happening.
Overall, the findings reveal a tension between the desire for a playful, green, and connected environment and the challenges of urban development, insecurity, crimes and ecological vulnerability.
2. Defining and Analysing Priority
In defining priority, I used STEEP method again to categorise the experience gained from the five senses discovery.
It is true that many sticky notes were pasted and voted on in social and environmental categories. This demonstrates how participants consistently and persistently address these two issues since the beginning, which implying these are the priority factors that define their ideal neighbourhood.
In the social context, participants were particularly concerned about security and privacy. During the sharing session, they frequently mentioned issues of criminality and premanisme (street thuggery), such as robbery, extortion, or pungutan liar (illegal levies). This premanisme often arises from power struggles between indigenous residents and recent migrants to the area. Conflicts tend to occur because the indigenous group—the Batavianese—still feel entitled to the land that they had previously sold to migrants.
Fun fact, the Indonesian word preman originates from the Dutch term vrijman, meaning ‘free man’. During the Dutch East Indies period, this label was used for informal workers, such as non-contract overseers, and former convicts seized by the Dutch. Many of them later took on roles as informal security guards or vigilantes, often serving to protect colonial interests. And now, this preman becomes a new term for street gangster who identified themselves as the protector or the guardian of the area.
Source: Merdeka.com
Reflecting on the first intervention, the Cipadu citizen did not mention any issues with premanism. The context of safety and social security they are dreaming of is mostly on how the area is safe for children to play.
Audio experience also plays a huge sensory factor that makes the environment comfortable. “Noises” is being mentioned for three times on the board, implying that sounds build a quality environment.
The ZINES
Here goes the zines from the participants slash the artists!
The question to answer on this zine-making is: “What are your ideas and thoughts about the future neighbourhood they want to a have?”.
During the zine-making session, I observed that people were putting in more effort in thinking about the ideas and content they wanted to include in the zines. I believe that the prompt or question that prompted the zine-making process should be clearer and more structured so that people feel more directed and know what to expect.
This laissez-faire zine-making format fostered a more creative and spontaneous output, allowing the collective imagination to manifest from the people’s aspirations. The themes expanded and evolved into a high-quality ethnography output from these zines.
Subsequently, these are some of the themes that emerged:
Community & Joy: Nafisa (happy community), Bila (togetherness).
We made some video presentation but I have not yet edit them yet, but surely going to upload them soon! But from the video presentations,
Connection with the first intervention
Later, I identified two major themes from the most keywords being mentioned througout the two interventions, with subthemes orbitting around them.
From these priorities, how to make these present challenges become the possible future.
The answer I can give right now, is “gotong royong” as the catalyst of bridging the present with possible futures.
DCIM\100GOPRO\GOPR0549.JPG
In the pressing situation, people often rely on improvisation and collective action (DelSesto, 2022). In Indonesia, we are coming together under the spirit of “sama rasa, sama rata” or a principle of equality and shared responsibility. This characteristic is deeply rooted in Indonesian culture through the practice of gotong royong, or mutual cooperation. Far from being merely transactional, gotong royong has historically been a crucial force in sustaining communities and even played a role in Indonesia’s struggle against colonial rule, as solidarity and collective resilience became sources of strength when external support was absent.
Bowen (1986) emphasize that gotong royong is not only a practical form of social organization but also a cultural ethos embedded in the Indonesian social fabric. It embodies the idea that when institutional or structural supports are lacking, people can still depend on one another—a value that continues to endure as part of Indonesia’s collective social DNA.
I experienced it myself during the process of making this research happened. I could not do this without mutual assistance I got from Indonesian back home and in the UK.
Therefore, what if Gotong Royong is not just a word or behaviour, but a design system that can be the engine for the hopes and dreams that made up our ecosystem?
Lastly, let’s close this long report with this beautiful sentence from Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino.
Bibliography
Biagioli, M., Pässilä, A. and Owens, A. (2021) ‘The zine method as a form of qualitative analysis’, in Adams, J. and Owens, A., Beyond Text: Learning through Arts-Based Research. Intellect. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1386/9781789383553_9.
Bowen, J.R. (1986) ‘On the Political Construction of Tradition: Gotong Royong in Indonesia’, The Journal of Asian Studies, 45(3), pp. 545–561. Available at: https://doi.org/10.2307/2056530.
DelSesto, M. (2022) Design and the social imagination. London ; New York: Bloomsbury Visual Arts (Designing in Dark Times).
Based on what we usually have known, or on ontological level, design are purposely made for mass production – Product, advertising, marketing and many others. This, however, leading to disillusionment on every emerging to established designers who were told they had the tools to make the world a better place, but instead the world takes its toll on them (Larusso, 2019). No wonder that being a designer always being claimed as one of the most stressful job.
Source: sainthoax
But not until I discover the emerging trend of Social Design, that I was firstly discovered from Ezio Manzini (I know I have mentioned his name several times in this blog). And my algorithm begins to change.
Source: ethicaldesign69
What if design can actually be ethical and be socially impactful? Is it a wishful thinking for everyone in the game?
Apparently, social designer term does exist and it is emerging in many regions. The collaboration also being encouraged by some institution because amidst this complexity of the world, people require radical changes that come from people. And that’s how I discovered Kampung Kollektief and Karasa BDG in Indonesia.
Kampung Kollektief
Source: Kampung Kollektief
Design and environment can work hand in hand to build more sociologically ethical community and ecology. This can happen if designers are integrating self-reflection with practical intervention to solve social problems. According to Geddes, the importance of ecological thinking and localized action can offer a model for addressing systemic challenges by understanding the interconnectedness of social and environmental issues (DelSesto, 2022).
Kampung Kollektief, a community-based design practice from Jakarta, Indonesia, has apparently proven this theory through its research design approach. The community was formed in response to the What if Lab open call. Designers from Indonesia and the Netherlands collaborated with urban communities in Kampung Susun Kunir in Jakarta and later Tarwewijk neighborhood in Rotterdam to explore the ownership and usage of public spaces by communities. This collaborative effort led to the establishment of Kampung Kollektief, which aims to involve communities in the co-creation of resilient futures based on diversity, kinship, resourcefulness, and respect for local values.
Their approach to creating a better future for Kampung Susun Kunir, whose neighbourhood was being demolished for urban development and relocated to new flat complexes, involved iterative participatory action research that called ‘Rujak Plaza’. This involved engaging the citizens in the design process and fostering connections and an iterative approach during the planning phase. In accordance with this, it makes me believe that they were committed to ensuring that the citizens had a say in the development of their community.
And that’s how I arranged a discussion with the designers of Kampung Kollektief – Dinda Ciptaviana and Iqra Firdausy – to ask them further about their project in this collective.
Source: Interview with Kampung Kollektief
Q: How do you come up with “Rujak Plaza” as your artifact in your intervention to engage people to participate in the research process?
The development of Rujak Plaza was an iterative process that began with a unique challenge during the What If Lab open call in Kampung Susun Kunir, themed “What If: Sustainable Public Space”.
Upon entering Kampung Susun Kunir, Dinda, Iqra, and other design team made a crucial discovery: there was no actual open space suitable for a traditional public park or playground. The area was densely populated, and any empty spaces were considered “conflict zones,” making them unusable. This presented a paradoxical starting point for a residency focused on public space. The process is reflecting further from its colonialism historical root, on how they are defining public spaces.
Source: Kampung Kollektief
Thus, the team were inviting the people of Kampung Kunir to reimagine the public space by collectively gathering their memories of the past Kampung Kunir before being demolished.
Source: Kampung Kollektief
Through these conversations, a significant and “simple but very striking” insight emerged: residents shared a powerful collective memory of their kampung being very green before 2015, where they used to plant and harvest fruit trees in front of their homes. They even remembered receiving a “green kampung” certificate from the local government due to this green environment.
Therefore, they initiated a placemaking as a public space based on a key activity inspired by communal harvesting of fruits to make rujak (fruit salad) and gathering together. The team identified this activity as an inherent, informal way the residents had “created public space” themselves.
Source: Kampung Kollektief
Rujak Plaza is a moveable planter that the people of Kampung Kunir can use to spark a new public space in the environment of flat complexes and also a symbolic meaning to reclaim the public space again.
Q: How do you introduce and inviting people to your intervention?
Since it is a co-designing process, the research is always involving the people in the process from the beginning to the end. Not only on the process, but also when we are exhibiting the ‘Rujak Plaza’ artifact on many events and symposium.
Source: Kampung Kollektief
Q: Is the “Rujak Plaza” still being used by the people in the neighbourhood, and what is the plan to sustain its existence?
“Rujak Plaza” can be considered an “artefact” of the research and design process. While the term “artefact” can have various connotations, in this context, it refers to a tangible outcome that facilitates continued community engagement and dialogue. As of the discussion, “Rujak Plaza” is still in use by the residents. The designers have observed new and unforeseen functions emerging from its use, indicating its adaptability and continued relevance to the community.
The “Rujak Plaza” project led to the formation of “Kampung Kolektif,” a new initiative aimed at continuing collaboration with the Kampung Kunir residents. Through this, one of the Dutch architects, Isabel, proposed applying a similar idea in Rotterdam, leading to the “Tarwewijk Town” project. Both projects explore public space interventions in urban areas with negative connotations, often associated with marginalized communities.
Source: Kampung Kollektief
While Kampung Kunir lacks physical public space but has a strong sense of community, Tarwewijk has abundant space but a weaker sense of community. Both projects aim to find similarities and differences in tackling these issues, with “Tarwewijk Town” currently in a testing phase. A notable similarity observed is the unexpected resistance from local authorities, mirroring challenges faced in Indonesia despite official funding for the project.
Q: So, is the project from both of the towns have shown any significant results?
Since the project is newly established, we are still observing the progress of both application in the given towns.
Q: What potential does the “Rujak Plaza” concept hold for other urban kampungs in Jakarta, and what is needed for its wider implementation?
We envision “Rujak Plaza” as a potential blueprint for other urban kampungs, particularly those located along riverbanks in Jakarta’s Old City, like the Ciliwung River. We believe that if the concept were adopted by other kampungs, it could transform the image and narrative of urban kampungs, empowering them to become agents of urban change. However, this cannot be achieved alone. A robust “ecosystem” of collaboration is crucial, involving social designers, communities, and potentially other stakeholders, to ensure the sustainability and scalability of such interventions.
Q: What are the main challenges faced by social designers in Indonesia, and how do they relate to the concept of “ecosystem of collaboration”?
Well of course, it is not easy to be a social designer in Indonesia. It is particularly the struggle to balance social impact with financial realities. Especially the concerns about the “crisis” social designers often face, navigating projects that may not be financially sustainable in the Indonesian context. This underscores the need for a stronger “ecosystem of collaboration” that can not only support impactful social design projects but also ensure the livelihood of social designers. The challenge lies in creating a sustainable model where social missions can be integrated into financially viable initiatives.
Karasa BDG
While Kampung Kollektief was originated from a design competition organized by Erasmus Huis, Karasa BDG emerged more organically through the initiative of Kang Kodir, a designer who had just moved to a new area and found discomfort living in that neighbourhood.
Karasa Bandung was founded first by Kang Kodir and later owned by a group of young people from Gempolsari RW 02, Bandung, who initiated a self-reliance movement driven by collaboration, creativity, and innovation. The word Karasa in Sundanese (West Java indigenous language) means ‘to be felt,’ reflecting their hope to create activities that have a real and positive impact on the community. Karasa Bandung also carries a message for the city itself, to make Bandung’s identity more ‘felt,’ as a creative city grounded in values of goodness and collective spirit.
Source: Karasa BDG
Kang Kodir shows how graphic design skill not only capable to transform an idea into a product, but transform graphic design into a new pedagogy in the youth so they can have a new kind of ‘cool’ activity other than doing crimes.
The idea of ‘Transform yourself to transform the world’ is strongly reflected in Karasa BDG. As Brown (2017) suggests, a passionate individual’s life, work, and relationships can become the ‘front line’ for practicing justice, liberation, and alignment with others and the planet. Karasa BDG reflects this notion, showing how the vision of one passionate person can inspire collective action by giving others a renewed sense of purpose.
Source: Google Meeting
Q: What is your trigger on making this movement?
In 2017-2018, me and my wife decided to moved from the city center near Bandung station to Gempolsari RW2 on the outskirts of Bandung. Because we want to start new.
Upon arrival, we were actually surprised by the environment. Gempolsari RW2, being a border area, was high in criminality and gangster activity, particularly during New Year’s celebrations, where people would carry swords. The presence of noisy motor workshops operating almost 24/7 also contributed to the whole discomfort, making us consider moving again.
However, we thought that there will always be discomfort everywhere we go. Then we thought, how do we challenge the status quo by making Gempolsari a comfortable place to live in?
So, my wife and I decided to get familiarize with the neighborhood by introducing ourselves to the community. We knocked on every neighbor’s door and gave them gifts as a friendly gesture. From there, we started brainstorming ways to utilize our design backgrounds. My wife and I then offered to contribute to the upcoming 17 Agustus (Independence Day) celebrations by painting the neighborhood gate (gapura). We chose this approach because it aligned with our design skills and felt less awkward than simply talking to residents.
When we were painting the gate, a lot of children came a long with curiosity. They asked whether they could also get involved in painting the gate. We welcomed the with open hand and ask them to pain the other part of the gate. Thus, it invited many children to joined the activity. And it made me think, what about we made a drawing session with children as a gesture to approach the residents?
Therefore, the drawing class happened and we are able to get to know the neighbors and the neighborhood even closer.
Source: Karasa BDG
Q: How’s this small gesture evolve into a collective?
The turning point on how Karasa initiated was occurred during a 17 Agustus drawing competition. I realized that many children, as young as 4-7 years old, were drawing Dutch flags instead of Indonesian flags and incorporating gangster symbols into their artwork.
This discovery deeply impacted my wife and I, revealing that the children in Gempolsari think that “coolness” were being shaped by their environment’s negative influences such as gangster.
I decided that instead of blaming the gangster, we focus should be on creating new, positive “coolness” (alternatif kekerenan baru) and amplifying good influences through design.
This led to a strategic shift: instead of primarily teaching young children, we decided to focus on empowering teenagers. The idea was that these teenagers, once skilled, could then teach the younger children, ensuring a more sustainable and long-lasting impact, acting as a “bridge” between the older and younger generations. This marked the conceptual beginning of Karasa, which later adopted its name from “Festival Merdeka Negara dan Bangsa”.
Q: What are the activities Karasa has done on Gempolsari?
Source: Karasa BDG
After teaching these teenagers design skills, we want them to apply their knowledge in a “graduation festival” where they can showcase and exhibit their graphic design talents. This event is highly anticipated and celebrated by the community. It has successfully transformed Gempolsari, a place once known for its dangerous reputation, into a vibrant creative village.
Source: Karasa BDG
We have an event call BrandGang with focus on revitalizing the neglected “branhang” (fire escape) alleys located behind houses, a common feature in Dutch colonial-era urban planning. Originally intended for emergency access and ventilation, these alleys often become dumping grounds or privatized spaces. We transforms these areas by painting murals on the doors with the teenangers, often with themes related to the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and cleaning up the alleys themselves. This initiative not only beautifies the area but also educates residents about the historical and safety functions of these spaces.
We also have an initiative called, “Play Gang” which rooted from the realization that the community lacks dedicated public spaces. Karasa BDG creatively repurposes these alleys and other available resources (like discarded mosque carpets or trash carts) to reclaiming public and play areas. For instance, we transformed a disused trash cart into a mobile game booth and turned old carpets and plywood into a mini-golf course.
Q: What an amazing initiative you have in here! I wonder how do you get the fund to realized all of these activities?
In Karasa BDG, we prioritize efficiency by utilizing minimal resources to maximize the utilization of available materials within the neighborhood. This approach aligns with our commitment to sustainability, as we actively engage in recycling waste and discarded items, transforming them into innovative and eco-friendly products.
Source: Karasa BDG
But sometimes, I used my personal fund from the project I got in my professional work. For projects like renovating the warung bakso (meatball stall), which cost Rp5 million, initial support also came from my personal network, including friends and his “inner circle” through co-funding.
Also, what comes from us goes for us as well. From the design collective by the youth, it sometimes generate income from professional design and mural projects outside the community. Me and Karasa team, utilizing the skills developed within Karasa, undertook paid work. A significant portion, specifically 15%, of the earnings from these external professional projects was directly reinvested into Karasa’s programs within the community. This means that the work done for clients elsewhere helped fund the local initiatives.
And again, Karasa operated with a philosophy of achieving creative impact with minimal capital and personnel. We want to be creative “tanpa modal” (without capital) or with “dana minim” (minimal funds), such as creating furniture from recycled cardboard from warung.
Q: What are the limitations in building Karasa?
I think the hardest part is envisioning the regeneration of this community. I realized a lot of teenagers are grown up and pursuing their dreams in university and professional work. So maybe, I might going to need more passionate teenagers or successor in the future to keep the Karasa’s spirit and existence alive in Gempolsari and the world.
Q: What is your hope for the Karasa in the future?
I think Karasa’s ultimate aspiration is for its initiatives to become a “culture” within the community, which I believe will require the consistent effort of three generations. A critical component of this is regeneration, where older youth are trained to become leaders and mentors for younger children, ensuring the movement continues and sustains itself even if the initiators are not always present.
We also envisions growing into a larger, more formalized entity. Hopefully, someday Karasa can become a school, or become a hub, or an institute. This aligns with our current practice of making RW2 a “living lab” for academic research, inviting external and international studies to collaboratively find solutions to community challenges.
While we starting locally, Karasa seeks to extend its influence, aiming for its movement to be recognized on a global scale, beyond just the city or province.
In summary, both Kampung Kollektief and Karasa BDG share a common thread that binds these collective: a shared issue, individuals with a common mission, a central hub, a group or individual driven by passion, and a spark of resilience. With these components, the collective inspired the people in the neighborhood to make a change.
Based on Emergent Strategy; Communities must develop the ability to recover and transform from hardships and injustices. This includes transforming toxic energy, hurt, and conflict into solutions by addressing the root causes of injustice, rather than simply punishing individuals. The concept that “nothing in nature is disposable” suggests that even perceived failures or conflicts can be transformed into growth and learning (Brown, 2017).
Resilience are like dandelions, they persist to grow in every places in every ways. Even though it can be hard to emerging in the beginning.
Bibliography:
Brown, A.M. (2017) Emergent strategy: shaping change, changing worlds. Chico: AK Press. DelSesto, M. (2022) Design and the social imagination. London ; New York: Bloomsbury Visual Arts (Designing in Dark Times).
Online Interview with Kampung Kollektief on 25 July 2025
Online Interview with Karasa BDG on 10 August 2025
Alright, I know how hard it is to explain my own project. Even to explain it as quick as 3 minutes elevator pitch. Not only to communicate it in English but also in Indonesian. Therefore, I spent my weekend to literate myself and redefining my research question after I did 3 tutorials in a row with Zuleika, Richie and Roger last week.
But now I am going to make it longer here (I HAVE TO).
Who Am I?
During an annotated bibliography session with Zuleika, I shared my frustration about how to position myself within this project. Who am I to galvanize a community to create change? Even after conducting my first intervention with the people in Cipadu last month, I still feel a significant gap between myself, the community’s overall needs, and my proposed ideas.
I asked myself several times: “what is my superpower?”
Zuleika suggested that I shall deepen my understanding of grassroots practice and connection, and recommended me to read Emergent Strategy by Adrienne Maree Brown to gain more insight into grassroots movements.
The book turned out to be deeply inspiring, expanding my perspective on enabling and mobilizing grassroots change. Brown’s work draws heavily on empirical insights and diverse research, with particular influence from Octavia Butler. Butler serves as Brown’s multifaceted inspiration for Emergent Strategy, profoundly shaping her views on change, leadership, and the role of imagination in creating a more just and liberated world.
The book revolves around Butler’s famous words: “All that you touch, you change. All that you change, changes you.” This quote drives the book’s core philosophy, planning through an emergent strategy rooted in the belief that transform yourself, transform the world.
The author focuses on how massive the wicked problems in the world, and we are just a tiny piece that makes up this world. Thus, we have to transform with our own capacity. A small ripple might create a big wave if it is constantly being moved. This also aligns with DelSasto’s idea in Design and Social Imagination (2022), that a change begins from one passionate person who has a goal in transforming the future. However, these ideas from two amazing authors did not validate my frustration on how can I step in to a neighbourhood that caught in a circle of wicked problems like Cipadu, if I only a who I am as a citizen, who works as an advertiser, design studio owner, a woman and never have I ever lead an entire community.
However, I did get snapped out of it. Twice.
Or maybe three times.
With Zuleika’s closing in our final session: “Well, you know exactly what to do, if you are an advertiser.”
Slapped.
And when I talked with Andi Qodir, a creative director of Karasa BDG who initiated Graphic Design Village in Gempolsari, Bandung, West Java. He said, some changes come from within. That is why he was able to create a new community within the society using his own superpower: graphic design.
I will elaborate more on my interview with Kang Kodir on the next blog report.
And lastly, is when I have group learning discussion at the CSM with my girls; Meaghan and Goldaneh.
After I showed them my research, they told me I was almost forgotten to give agency and authority about my project. When I might already know who am I and what am I capable of. I was too focused on searching my superpower, when it is already there–facilitating people to share their story.
Therefore, I am Sasha, a creative strategist who have been working as a strategist and advertiser for almost 5 years, an Indonesian, an Asian, a Muslim, a sci-fi fan, and currently interested in design for social innovation. And I know I can help people communicating their story, and enhance them with a tailored storytelling.
Who Am I Talking To?
But who is this project for?
When I explain my recent findings and my presentation to both Richie and Roger, I got an input to give more context towards my communication so that I can communicate it with my targeted audience effectively and efficiently.
Roger specifically gave his direct feedback on my presentation, which are:
You should carefully consider the context and audience for each piece of communication you create. Especially, the relationship between visuals and text when you’re speaking or presenting. This often means creating two or three different versions of your PowerPoint, depending on the situation and who you’re presenting to. (Don’t forget to keep your original version as part of your research documentation.)
For your written report, the audience may be less varied, but it’s still important to pay attention to the tone, formality, and voice of your writing based on who is likely to read it.
As for your Learning Log or Blog, you may not have a clearly defined audience, but it’s important to remain authentic—while still aligning with the academic or professional fields you’re engaging with.
So from all of these feedbacks, it is clearly I have to put myself on different positioning when I talk with different stakeholders within my database. Thus, I try to map out my stakeholder radar into this image:
Most of the core target audience are apparently falls into grassroot to marginalized community. As subsequence to this, I need to make the presentation that can deliver a residual communication, based on what Richie said, so it will a meaningful impact for the people at the core and the ring 1 of my stakeholder.
Moreover, this is the latest picture of the neighbourhood on 14 August 2025. The huge rain was pouring excessively until it flooded the entire neighbourhood. Pak Ade, the village leader, told me the flood height is up until an adult’s belly length. This tragedy torn my heart apart, because apparently the flood came from its nearby area that has higher sea level than the area in Cipadu.
Their situation, location and condition are highly vulnerable. I realized that having a serious conversation at this point of time might not be really helpful for them. I believe it will be better if I can facilitate a co-design discussion that could spark an imaginative yet casual approach for them.
As Imaginative as Possible
And as critical as possible.
Because when I am spiralling, Richie told me that “sometimes the gap is found in your critical thinking”. It is also important to give your ideas a perspective, so I will found the most important matters when I am being critical over it.
Then instead of thinking of what this project could be in the future, I landed myself in the present time to think what I can do NOW!
So I read,
I write,
I read
and I map out.
If imagination does not come naturally, because it requires sensibility and understanding to enhanced imagining experience, which later can stimulate idea of possibilities (DelSesto, 2022). But how would I be able to facilitate people to nurture their radical ideas to improvise the way they live in the neighborhood?
Well, not until Goldaneh’s notification popped out on my phone.
She sent me the article about worldbuilding that might be relevant to my project. The article already hooked my attention with its abstract begins with “We will look at Worldbuilding as a methodology, as a tool able to define our future, a tool where the only limit is the one, we fix, a tool able to scale” (Grenier, 2022) which is fascinating because I thought that worldbuilding is for gaming. But then I realized, this is related to what Richie told me about scenario based experience, and my initial idea on making an Imaginarium for social innovation.
Thus, I probably will be able to develop a “Future Neighbourhood” based on speculated future from social realities, to spark hope in people.
AND I finally come up with an idea for my next intervention. Co-design the world that people want based on multimodality experience using zine-making. Zine-making is a universal medium for people to make art, and everyone is welcome! I am trying to take an action on this with Indonesian Collective in London called ‘London Bergerak’ to initiate an event as shown below:
Let’s see whether an Imaginarium based on worldbuilding and design for social innovation does really work as an emergent to make people contribute in building their vulnerable neighbourhood.
The event will be held on August 16th 2025! See ya lateer~
Bibliography:
DelSesto, M. (2022) Design and the social imagination. London ; New York: Bloomsbury Visual Arts (Designing in Dark Times).
I went to Are You Mad workshop on July 22nd 2025 at Coal Drops Yard, King’s Cross for a Paper Making from fabric waste workshop, and it was so amazing yet I found it very relaxing.
Are You Mad is collaborating with a fabric waste recycling organization called Fibrelab based in East London, who actively collecting fabric materials from all over the place and turned them into various renewed products, including paper pulp materials.
Generally, the selected waste fabrics are using organic fabrics such as cotton and denim because they are easier to be recycled rather than any other inorganic materials like polyester. Regardless most of the clothes are mainly using organic fabrics, there is still a mystery on how to recycle or giving a second chance to any inorganic materials. So if I want to implement this pulp-making from waste fabric in Cipadu, I will still another ways to take action on the inorganic fabric materials that might also clog up in the sewers of Cipadu.
The process of pulp-making is typically easy, in my opinion, for everyone. You just need a waste of patchworks or fabric scrap, proper blender to blend all of the scrap, papermaking mould from wooden frame and mesh, huge containers for the pulp, cloth canvas, towel and sun!
If you are low in motoric, you may find dipping your hand with the mesh a little bit disgusting. But, it was just a beginning because I am not used with clogged sink in the kitchen as well. Moving forward, the decorating the paper was the most interesting part! I’ve got to experimenting different color of the pulp and combine them into a new type of color. I was also capable to decorate each of the papers using the remaining scraps and other materials.
This might not be my best result, but I enjoy the process very much. I might want to do this again later. And I thought, this might also can be a great activity to do to recycle the unwanted scraps from Cipadu’s textile industry.
However, I still need a lot to learn on how to turn waste into artistic piece, or maybe another product. Thus, I think I might be going to explore further on what are the ways I can recycle for fun!
Update 8 October 2025
I think this was my effort to answer their problem on my own design, rather than through theirs. Eventhough I did not continue to “find the solution” by finding what ‘how’ that works better for them, now I realize it is better to do systematic thinking collectively. So we are all liberated to choose our own way to find a better way to live in such wicked condition.
In my research, I have adapted several literature as the foundation theories for my projects. These resources explore design, future studies, and collaboration as the core principles behind my work.
Since my previously annotated bibliography might not have fully reflected and integrated into my research questions, I will now base my bibliography on my current blog post.
Manzini, E. (2015) Design, when everybody designs: an introduction to design for social innovation. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press.
I used to believe that design was solely about planning and producing closed-ended products and services, heavily narrowed on expected outcomes. Being caught in a capital-driven process eventually made me feel disillusioned about identifying myself as a designer. This pushed me into a constant shift in my professional path—from strategist to designer—as I searched for a meaning of being a designer within the so-called creative industry. And my concern, is somehow nodded by Ezio Manzini when I found the term of design for social innovation.
Design for social innovation is trying to reimagine the function of design into a potential process of triggering and supporting social change. At some cases, design for social innovation is foreseen as a process that can develop original or existing social invention into more structured prototypes and/or social enterprises. So instead of always asking what’s needs to be new or renew, social innovation help to fill in the fracture, bridging the gap between design and social humanities.What I find inspiring is how this positions designers as enablers for social invention, using their expertise and technology to identify and amplify grassroots ideas, making social invention elevated into more accessible, impactful, sustainable, and scalable innovation.
[Update on 19th Nov 2025]
In my recent research progress, after discussing my project with urban designers, I discovered that they believe collaboration with communication designers can help bridge the gap between the community and urban designers. This collaboration, as described by Manzini’s diagram, is known as a design coalition. Communication designers possess the ability to grasp the imagination and make sense of the radicality of their ideas using a grounded communication theory. They then develop these ideas into visual data, which can later be transformed into social data.
Design for social innovation is often related to other discipline in order co-design take part in social innovation.
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Co-design has been echoed and integrated into many practices of design and production. Manzini highlights co-design is an approach that positions design as a powerful tool to address complex social challenges. It involves a wide range of stakeholders and reimagines design as a form of service and critical inquiry for development.
[Update on 19th Nov 2025]
Based on my professional career, designers from specific discipline are doing the end-to-end process in their design project. Oftentimes, it created biases and make less discussion. In my co-design session in Cipadu, when the experts, residents and government immersed into the discussion, it emerged many undiscussed issue in the development. Thus, it validates how strong and supportive circle can spark social innovation.
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Social innovation requires a strong system and supportive circle. In this book, he stated that social innovation can sparked from “social heroes”, and requires a supportive organization or institution that can make the innovation last over time, grow and multiply. It took a village to change the future.
And not only start with passionate people, but also means by giving people voice and room to imagine the change they want to see. By relating to individual problems and communities validation, it will build new possibilities, not only a single solutions.
The last important component is to identifying problem in both its local and its general dimension. This means to envision the local problem with the general or global problem that might create an impactful, sustainable, and scalable innovation that can be amplified to future challenges.
[19 November 2025]
The philosophy of gotong royong or mutual assistance is very deeply visible in the theory of social innovation. Especially when the co-design session is being held for the third times. However, the social innovation might not be suitable to solve wicked problems that are complex like Cipadu because its orientation is to find the sustaining design that solve specific problems. Hence, social innovation is best for the ground philosophy but needs more theory that is more suitable for understanding complexity.
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DelSesto, M. (2022) Design and the social imagination. London ; New York: Bloomsbury Visual Arts.
DelSasto appear to extending the concept of sociological imagination as first introduced by C. Wright Mills in 1950s, with the term of social imagination. To begin with, Mills’ sociological imagination is a potential quality of mind and a mode of thought, or a human capacity. In this definition, Mills also linked the causes of individuals problem (biography) with what is the background or the history that happened universally.
Sociological imagination aims to make the familiar strange and the strange familiar by linking personal experiences to broader societal contexts. While initially felt on an individual level, this experience resonated with many others globally. What began as a personal struggle ultimately reflected a widespread issue, which illustrating the concept of sociological imagination.
However, DelSesto expands the idea of human capacity and ways of thinking through the concept of social imagination, which goes beyond the sociological imagination that tends to focus solely on present realities, as what social sciences or sociology always been. Instead, social imagination encourages a future-oriented, collective way of thinking about what could be possible by analyzing “wicked problems”.
[19 November 2025]
Initially, I thought my disillusionment on my neighbourhood was only my personal feeling. But when gathering the residents all together and sharing our aspiration and imaginations towards the future, we were all able to connect the dots within our each other struggles. This exploration is really relevant towards social imagination that apparently can untied all the complexity together and seeing it as something collective.
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Wicked problems are complex issues without clear root causes and involve constantly changing variables, for example is problem in poverty. According to Rittel and Webber’s definition, such problems require bold thinking and innovative research, not only to understand their nature but also to imagine what solutions might look like. This is exactly how social imagination is needed, to engage the people on what the world they want to live and see. And somehow, the wicked problem is fully dependent and tangled into specific issue or area only, it makes some intervention in specific area can not be replicable.
[19 November 2025]
In case of Cipadu, the communities face ongoing socioecological struggles after being convicted from South Jakarta, such as recurring floods, poor and corrupt governance, which made people often experience social resignation. DelSesto also mentioned this social averse behaviour happened because the complexity is uncanny therefore people are giving up to pulling which thread that matter first.
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Design and the social imagination also trying to link the distinctive sector between design and social sciences. Design professions have typically been associated with intervention, communication and action, while social science has long been associated with thought and reflection. Often times, design and social thought are too frequently considered distinct in terms of how theories can be applied in practice.
[19 November 2025]
Design and the Social Imagination merges the creative, action-oriented sensibility of design with the reflective, analytical capacities of the social sciences to provide ideas, and strategies for shaping the future. This is why every intervention I’ve made has focused on modeling interventions that iterate based on previous feedback from users. Apparently, there are still many participatory practices that are leading to answers that are less democratic.
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Therefore, DelSesto introducing social imagination as the extension of realities using possibilities and creativity. He also referred to Zygmunt Bauman’s human praxis about fundamental basis of human societies, where human can be both subjects and objects of unfolding social realities. So practically, human have their own agency to transform existing conditions into something imagined if only they are provided and facilitated in the community.
The human mind might full of creative potential to invent and make, is also highly conditioned and habit forming around routines of the status quo. It can be personally, professionally, and politically more comfortable to accept the world as it is rather than reinventing or innovate the world as they imagined. This is why laboring to re-make the very conditions under which new social realities might come into being is a daring and courageous act.
[Updated on 19th Nov 2025]
Press, J. and Celi, M. (2024) Designing Sustainable Futures: How to Imagine, Create, and Lead the Transition to a Better World. 1st ed. New York: Routledge. Available at: https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003451693.
World bank stated that climate change is driven in large part by economic and social inequalities across the world, as retold by this book. This statement is very strong in terms of how society seeing the future and especially sustainability nowadays. From this uncertainty, this book invite us to explores some of the emerging practices to reimagine and transition to a better world. Some of the practices that are being used are speculative futures, worldbuilding/design fiction and collaboration.
Through this book, it inspired me to dig deeper towards design for transition and also analyzing the social data that I gained from the third intervention using speculative narratives.
Designing sustainable futures also involves exploring experiential futures as one of its practices. This means encouraging people to experiment with foresight in a radical manner to explore the possibilities of their futures. Press et al. also classifying possible futures using speculative narrative to give people insight on how they want to achieve their future. This is important because, facilitaros often do a workshop, that made people get excited, but nothing changed “Monday morning.”
This cycle of discussion without action is dangerous. It breeds cynicism among participants, undermining the very momentum needed to tackle urgent problems. When people see that envisioning a better future is treated as a performative exercise rather than the first step in a real process, they disengage. The book argues that to make real progress, we must commit to closing the gap between the workshop and the workplace, transforming visionary conversations into tangible strategies and actions.
From this book, which I found after I contemplated on what to do to next, so I will not only exploiting the people’s hope in this co-design session. Designing sustainable futures also validated that we need to make participation democratic and continous using the existing technology to make it relevant. And because of that, the idea of making speculative narratives is emerged. Not only for analyzing the problems, but also archiving people’s ideas that can be interpreted and implemented by the urban developers, and relevant to the residents.
This book effectively implement new mindset using design to create preferable futures. The book champions “Futures Literacy” as a critical capability for everyone, not just futurists or strategists. As described by UNESCO’s Riel Miller, Futures Literacy is not about predicting the future. Its purpose is to empower us to use our imagination about the future to see the present more clearly and act with greater agency.
Pink, S., Akama, Y. and Sumartojo, S. (2019) Uncertainty and possibility: new approaches to future making in design anthropology. Reprinted. London New York, NY Oxford New Delhi Sydney: Bloomsbury Academic.
Pink et al. propose a new method for engaging with the future that shifts the focus from anticipation and control to actively using uncertainty as a catalyst for change.
Their methodology, rooted in action research, is designed to analyze emergence; the constant arising of new phenomena, during the research process. This research argue that since we inhabit ever-changing systems where new elements are continuously emerging, it’s likely to be impossible to be certain about what future will bring, or assume we can fully control them.
There is a strong parallel between this concept and my research on Cipadu’s “wicked problems.”
This analysis leads my research to explore the potential of adopting Pink et al.’s central idea: deliberately utilizing uncertainty not as an obstacle, but as a tool to generate new possibilities in the Cipadu context.
Like the uncertainty context as described by Pink et al., Cipadu’s issues are interconnected and tangled, meaning that the emergence of one problem often triggers or affects several others in a cascading effect.
The intervention confirmed the complexity of the situation, as the negative issues mentioned by the people outweighed the positive aspects. But this does not mean the outcome is failed, instead the positive aspect can be a silver lining that can be a spark of hope in seeing the future, which is through gotong royong.
In the book, it is mentioned how “designing collaboratively with people is to immerse in emergence and chance while attuning with slippery, un-namable tones and expressions that can only be sensed through our feeling and bodily encounter to other people’. This is very strong idea because I would never be able to empathized and immersed towards the problems of the residents if I was not able to be in the Cipadu. Regardless being immersed can also be emotionally involved and drained, the important aspects that found in the offline session can’t be found during the online co-design session.
Human of twentieth century are so obsessed seeing risk as something that needs to be heavily anticipated and controlled, which Giddens explained it as “risk society”. Which made anticipation turned into anxiety and later will turn into risk averse behaviour. This is also understandable because the complexity from modern society has bring, make people cautious on wanting to know “what next”. This is creating failure in the human system.
Anthropological and historical views, however, reveal a richer understanding of uncertainty as a potentially fertile condition. The authors advocate for an intentional shift to engage with the reality of constantly emerging systems, seeing uncertainty not as an obstacle requiring mitigation but as a dynamic resource for developing new forms of understanding, imagining, and intervening in the future.
This view is very radical but also a new way to train human cognition to altered uncertainty into possibility, which we often see it as “being positive”. People always told me that not everyone can also be positive in their situation, and it is very much understandable. Especially in this age and time of the century. However, positivity can be a control and also the way of surviving. Cipadu has been massively exploited internally and externally, yet they are still believing in each other because togetherness makes them together. This such a powerful tool and belief for making people binding and build possibility.
[Updated on 19th Nov 2025] Additional Bibliographt
Bregman, R. (2021) Humankind: a hopeful history. Translated by E. Manton and E. Moore. London: Bloomsbury Publishing.
It is true that human is driven by selfishness and self-interest, it is a very basic human nature and act of survival according to Bregman, as he begins the book. In contrary, he also believe people that it is realistic and revolutionary, so to speak, that people are altruistics or good.
Using several case studies, he showed several examples on how crisis and uncertain conditions make people hand in hand to help each other, strengthened the community with solidarity. Thus, human long for a safety from fear and have a ‘a perpetual and restless desire of power, that ceaseth only in death’. Which later resulted in ‘a condition of war of all against all.’ But Hobbes also give argument towards this–anarchy can be tamed and peace established, if only we all agree to pursue liberty.
Fear disempowered civilization to have democracy to choose the way they live. On the other, Rousseau: it was the structures of civilisation that made humans self-interested.
Another interesting finding that I found in this book is an observation from Morris Janowitz and Edward Shils. They were observing the reason behind the resilience and why did the Germans continue to fight so hard during the war. Were they brainwashed or possessed by any ideology that blinds them in the combat? However, the result of the observation was the otherwise. It was Kameradschaft/Friendship. All those hundreds of bakers and butchers, teachers and tailors; all those German men who had resisted the Allied advance tooth and nail had taken up arms for one another. And apparently it goes the same with American soldiers who fought in Vietnam, their camaraderie that drives them to fought to each other.
Some truth are so painful to accept, how can every soldiers in the world were actually driven by the empathy and humanity towards each other? Although there is no excuse in doing war and crimes, but people do have sense of defending to one another in friendship. Making solidarity a strong kinship to progressing or achieving a certain goals.
Apparently it is also rooted from how human is actually rooted deeply in empathy, although it might not naturally presence in human. Bregman quoted from Professor Paul Bloom, empathy operates like a spotlight, highlighting a specific person or group of people in one’s life, while simultaneously causing the rest of the world to “fade away”. Thus, it is hard for people to empathize every single persons in the world. He argues, that human does not only need empathy but also compassion to give about the change.
For my second intervention, I am going to test a new method on how can creative self-confidence can influence collective imagination. In a book called Citizen Designer: Perspectives on Design Responsibility, there is a question that intrigued me: how can a heterogeneous society develop shared values and yet encouraged cultural diversity and personal freedom? At some senses, finding similar voices or shared values can be a struggle for a people in a multicultural environment such as metropolitan cities. Also, the rapid urbanization makes daily struggles among citizens becoming more complex and unexplainable, making people choose to tolerate rather than taking action about it. The failure to imagine differently is a result from a profound alienation which has been heavily conditioned by institutions (DelSasto, 2022).
The triggers often coming from the sense of powerlessness especially for the vulnerable or the marginalized groups, just like the people in urban villages. According to the first online intervention with Cipadu citizen, they were satisfied for having a forum where they were facilitated to share their ideas and mapping their thoughts about their neighbourhood. The quality of the conversation enabled them to identify key interconnected issues—social, economic, and environmental—that they had sensed but previously lacked evidence to speculate. Through the co-design discussion, they were finally able to engage in a meaningful dialogue that led to the development of well-formed, collective ideas.
In fact, this proven the sociological imagination as introduced by C. Wright Mills, linking the complex issue that is currently happening in the present with history and personal background. Annotated from National University Blog, Mills believed that finding a balance between systems and the individuals within them was essential to understanding their dynamic relationship, as well as the social structures that arise from conflicts between different groups. An individual issue might link with others, and it can be a solid evident on how systemic issue might trouble a society, thus connection and quality discussion should be taken place.
Lesson from Gotong Royong
Regardless Indonesia is often known for their comraderies or mutual assistance or gotong royong collective imagination seemed to be hardly woven into a tool for problem enquiry. This also evoked from the people in Cipadu from the previous workshop, they appreciated the sense of gotong royong among the neighborhood as their spirit in the urban village. But apparently, gotong royong does not cater the collective imagination that happened to be important human capital for the betterment. Social Imagination should be a method in building a quality conversation and interaction, using people’s daily experience (or we can say autoethnography) that can turn into actionable future solution. Social imagination bridge the gap with design and social sciences, planning with reflective, to actively explore the wicked problems using collective mode of thoughts (DelSasto, 2022).
One of the answers on the Padlet, showing how they actually wanted to be seen and heard by the province level government official. This can give indication that people want to be heard and to be given the attention immediately. However, in a midst of complex modern problem requires radical innovation that sparked from bottom-up (Manzini, 2015). This finding makes me want to explore Design as Social Innovation.
This term was also introduced by Ezio Manzini as Design as Social Innovation, where multiplicity of actors, experts and non-experts, interact to co-design the innovation for change or initiative. When everybody design or involved in designing process, it will give more agency to the people in the urban village by becoming their own changemaker and curators of their own area.
This reflection made me mapping out my idea into Theory of Change framework, with focus on several goals reflected from the citizen inquiries:
Make the aspiration heard by giving people agency to become the changemaker of their own area.
Build a resilient, creative urban village.
Make gotong royong as the DNA of the community that can trigger social innovation.
From that idea, I managed to iterate a new framework for the next workshop or intervention, by focusing on self and how it can be reflected to others in order to elevate potential in the urban camaraderie.
Phase 1: Identify the Friends and the Villains
“Villain & Friend Mapping with STEEP” (Individual/Small Group)
Based on the “Memory Maps,” participants identify specific “Friends” and “Villains.” Crucially, for each “Villain,” they also assign a this indentification method can be varied, from curating experiences by 5 senses and also STEEP category (Social, Technological, Economic, Environmental, Political).
Phase 2: Acknowledge your Superpowers
“Hero Within: Discovering Your Superpower” Introduce the concept of citizen superpowers. Provide “Superpower Cards Prompts” (e.g., The Connector, The Storyteller, The Innovator, The Guardian). The superpower will be given using a quick “superpower test”. In addition, each person will be given a “shield” with a symbol for their superpower and a short “superhero name,” stating how their superpower can help the village.
Phase 3: Assembling The Heroes League
Group participants into diverse “Heroes Leagues” (4-6 people), ensuring a mix of identified “superpower archetypes” within each team. This enables a balanced and inclusive debate. As a whole group, or within teams followed by a plenary sharing, collectively prioritize the top 2 most pressing “villains” from that the “Heroes Leagues” will focus on for their missions.
Phase 4: Mission & Imaginarium Activation
“Superpower Synergy for a Regenerative Future”: This is the core imagination activation. Teams brainstorm (and document in their zine) how their combined “superpowers” can overcome the “villain.” They visualize and describe what a truly regenerative future would look like once this “villain” is defeated, focusing on vibrant aspirations.
Phase 5: Collective & Cross-Pollination
This process is using world’s cafe method, using “host” and “visitor” role play to rotate through other teams’ stations in timed rounds. Visiting teams learn about the “villain” and the imaginative solutions from the host team, offering their own insights, questions, and building upon the ideas. They can add notes or sketches to the zine/station’s evolving content.
Phase 6: Discussion!
This is the phase where every groups share their opinion and how they collaborate to explore their common “enemies” all together.
This method of participatory discussion will be first implemented with fellow Indonesian diasporas in London, in collaboration with an Indonesian student collective called @LondonBergerak with different question, so it will be more fit in with various Indonesian background in here.
If the method promising and actually opening up to the new narrative, it can be iterate and be implemented again with the Cipadu citizen in September.
UPDATE on 8 October 2025
After a thorough iteration and discussion with my tutor, I decided to make the designing process more seamless for the second intervention by focusing more on liberating guided discussion.
Here is the updated framework for facilitating the co-design process:
Inspired by action research methodology, this discussion framework will be focusing more on individual’s and people’s collective experience. Which later trigger can trigger discourse and knowledge sharing.
It begins with Discovery, where participants engage through the 5 Senses to evoke memories and ground experiences in lived realities. This sensory-based exploration helps uncover emotional and contextual insights.
The process then moves to Analysing, using the STEEP Method (Social, Technological, Economic, Environmental, Political) and a Priority Matrix to make sense of what, who, and why matters—transforming observations into meaningful understanding.
Next is Proposing, a stage of ideation that encourages “what if” thinking to imagine alternative futures or possibilities for change.
Finally, Reflection involves presentation and cross-pollination—sharing insights with others to generate feedback, collective learning, and new directions. The framework is cyclical and iterative, meaning reflection often loops back to discovery or analysis, allowing the process to evolve continuously.
Overall, it emphasizes co-creation, iteration, and the blending of experiential, analytical, and imaginative methods to design with communities rather than for them.
Thank you Liz for reminding me that this project is not designing the future that I want, but designing the future that we– the people – want.
After the PAR session with the citizen, I shared them the feedback form to assess and rate the activity they’ve just done on Padlet.
And I found some interesting insights from the people:
Half of the respondents said this is their first time doing the participatory discussion and the half of it said they often had this kind of discussion before.
And surprisingly, most of the respondents said that Padlet is very useful and the rest said it is useful for them. This reminds me with an opinion from one of the citizens, he said that using padlet putting less pressure for them rather than to “speak” in the public. And it nodded by the others during the online meeting and also in the WhatsApp group.
And yes, they found using tools like Padlet actually works for them. Using creative tools apparently makes them confident to share their aspiration, hence the result is they were able to navigate their memories, hidden narrative and imaginations.
Apparently, participants suggested extending the discussion time for more lively or offline interaction. In addition, there’s a desire for regular, recurring discussions to monitor village development and for more frequent sharing sessions. Hopes were also expressed for the implementation of ideas, and readiness for future participation was affirmed. It was quite a surprise, because after two hours of long discussion, they seemed to enjoy it even longer. I guess during the offline session it will be better to keep the duration open while manage to make the environment more engaging with an extra experience – snacks or ice-breaking.
Everyone preferred offline interaction apparently! This solidified my intention to implement the next intervention directly with the participants offline!
Aside from longer duration of the event, people expected seamless modes of questions such as using multiple-choice questions to save time, and holding the discussion directly in person. The enthusiasm was seemed to be present as the discussion was considered communicative, very constructive, and very useful for residents. It was also noted that such forums encourage discussion within the community. They are also wish that the continuity of the forum will regenerate ot only serve academic purposes but also benefit many people, and might include more discussion tha related to other emerging urban village issues. Which hopefully I will!
In Conclusion
The citizens expressed a strong desire for the forum to continue and to offer more opportunities for direct interaction, as they found it highly valuable for shaping their ideas. Through the discussion, many were surprised to discover that their individual hopes and expectations were shared by others, aspirations that had often gone unspoken. This collective imagination appeared as a powerful and hopeful force that could inspire action. When people from diverse backgrounds and roles come together to share their visions, it encourages a spirit of mutual support—what Indonesians call gotong royong—to pursue a shared dream of a better, more realistic future.
In this context, turning aspirations into reality requires collective sense-making, built on the foundation of self-confidence and the power to recognize one’s own ideas as meaningful sources of hope. Therefore, in the next session I will add a modes to make people discovering their potentials or superpowers.
