Blog – Catapult Design

July 7, 2010 - By Emily Eisenhart

CataCAMP Workshop: Exploring Values – What Matters and Why?

At CataCAMP, our ‘Exploring Values’ workshop [download workshop here] took place at the Navajo Nation’s new Fire Rock Casino. Surprised? A week prior to CataCAMP, we would’ve been as well. There’s much debate surrounding the building of casinos on reservations the country over. Is it tampering with local lifestyle and culture? Will it give jobs to Navajos or take them away? With limited purchasing options already, is spending at the casino a good use of funds?

Fire Rock, the first Navajo casino, outside Gallup, NM.

A week of CataCAMP changed our group’s perception of casinos on Native land. We’ll be the first to admit that we interacted with only a sliver of the Navajo population (there are 180,000+ individuals on the Res). Yet each testimonial of the casino was alarmingly positive. People really enjoyed themselves there! It was a local attraction – a place to go with friends, to spend some set aside cash, to let loose. We won’t go as far to say it was a core value of the Navajo Nation, but it was part of life and was recognized as valuable.

Values shape our perception of and interaction with the world. They help determine what is important to us, and structure our motivations and priorities. At CataCAMP, we were constantly uncovering values.

In workshop, doing the values card activity

Throughout CataCAMP we were privileged to be in the presence of extraordinarily generous and curious individuals, all of whom wanted to share their experiences and tell us about their culture. Much of the values insight we received came from “innocent” conversation, chit-chat in the car, while other information came from more structured questioning. We would notice a particular behavior characteristic and ask about it, would listen to stories of Navajo myths and relate them to today, or would observe the interactions of family members and friends. And we asked “why?” a lot.

Our cookout with homestay family

In the short time we were there, the values of the individuals with whom we stayed (and much of the Navajo Nation at large) became clear. It was evident that, to our homestay family, fostering strong familial relationships was most important. Outings and celebrations became a family activity, and all are encouraged to participate. In Navajo culture, your family includes everyone from your immediate family to your extended relatives (your female cousin would be considered your sister, called “sister cousin”).

Leonard, in traditional Navajo silver and turqouise jewelry

Mud hogan, for traditional ceremonies

Navajo culture – the language, myths, food, dress and ceremonies – is at the center of life. The older generations we met would speak to each other almost solely in Navajo, while the younger generations would slip in and out of Navajo and English, or just stick to English. In talking with a grandmother at the homestay, we learned that she wished her grandchildren would learn Navajo; she valued the linguistic preservation of her culture. Many stories and myths were told to us by Leonard, our host, who is practicing to be a medicine man. He told us of the importance of native plants and herbs, of the four corners of the Earth and of the sacred mountains, of the Navajo creation story, of cleansing ceremonies like the Enemy Way, and of the changing ways of Navajo people. Deenise, our friend and guide at the Navajo Tribal Utility Authority, told us of the significance of animal crossings (snakes or owls passing in front of you), of where and how to collect Navajo Tea in the wild, of the strength of words and how they hold meaning, and of ways to make peace with the world and stay out of harm’s way by containing that which belongs to you (when you brush your hair, and strands fall out, you are supposed to dispose of, or burn, the hair so as to remove it from area, lest some ill-willed individual collects it to use it against you. Similar to our concept of voodoo, she said).

Bessie's herd of sheep

Other entities that held significance included traditional food (fry bread, which is served with almost every meal, and mutton), land (land ownership is important for building upon or farming and herding, and homesteads are passed down through the family, although with large extended families, land ownership is quite tricky and often contested), livestock (our family owned 70 sheep, a herd of cattle and several horses), access to water (our homestay father spent half of his time hauling water from the water source to his home and back, and lamented that he wished it were less), electricity (18,000 homes throughout the Navajo Nation are without utility services), and good health (a high percentage of the population is affected by obesity, diabetes, alcoholism and hypertension, and there are increasing measures to combat these epidemics).

Our group came away from the week-long experience with a deeper understanding of the values, priorities and desires of the Navajo people. We met many resilient, generous, warm people, and started many new friendships. Our eyes were opened to alternative ways of viewing and experiencing the world, and for that we are thankful.

Land near Sawmill

As researchers and designers, it is our job to explore values, and to uncover the “why” behind the “what” when it comes to what is important, be it objects, relationships or social systems. Designers who understand specific cultural values have a huge, and very valuable, advantage in their ability to create products and services that will meaningfully and effectively meet people’s needs. Although this was not our primary goal, Catapult now has a better sense of ways in which we might be able to assist organizations on the Res in the design/tech realm in the near future. Stay tuned for more information!

July 4, 2010 - By Heather

Catapult heads to the Unreasonable Institute

Catapulters head to Boulder, CO this week to take part in the Unreasonable Institute‘s Summer Institute, a 10-week program uniting up to 25 young social entrepreneurs with bold ideas from around the world. The Unreasonable Institute was founded by Daniel Epstein and Teju Ravilochan with this simple idea: give high-impact social entrepreneurs wings. To do that, “We attract experts, innovators, and specialists in the field of social entrepreneurship, investment, business, poverty eradication, engineering, health, and the civil sector to mentor them.”

Catapult is excited to join that line up, spending three days with the entrepreneurs and running a short workshop series on prototyping. With the entrepreneurs we’ll walk through methods of rapidly testing out ideas both physically and experientially.

Follow the Unreasonable Institute’s progress through their recently launched “Unreasonable TV Episodes.”

By Heather | Posted in Latest News | Comments (0)

July 4, 2010 - By Heather

CataCAMP: 8 days on the Navajo Reservation

This year we kicked off CataCAMP, our first staff training program, out on the Navajo Reservation in Northern Arizona. The objectives of CataCAMP are simple: build our staff’s field experience, create and share a public library of design workshops based on a year of project experience, and allow each member of our multi-disciplinary to teach the rest of us their skills and viewpoints.

Catapult’s work is as heavily rooted in cultural observation and research as it is design and technology. From the moment Tyler and I started this organization, we knew we would have to build a team of “engineering anthropologists” – talented folks who can bridge the technology world with the needs of people in a culture completely outside their own. We focused this year’s training primarily on cultural research methods. In order to practice these skills in real-time, we wanted to immerse the team in a foreign, unfamiliar culture. Why the Navajo Reservation? Catapult serves impoverished communities, and the Native American population is the most poverty-stricken community within the United States. More than half of the Navajo Nation residents live below the poverty level. Yet they have culturally rich lives with many still practicing and preserving traditional ways.

CataCAMPers with Bessie from our host family.

Our Catapult team – comprised of backgrounds in product design, mechanical engineering, anthropology, international relations, user experience design, and marketing and advertising – spent eight days living on the reservation absorbing the culture, visiting tribal entities, engaging with a host family, and conducting a series of workshops.

The first few days were spent outside Sawmill, AZ at a summer sheep camp with the Begay family, our generous hosts. We pitched our tents outside their hogan (the traditional, octagonal Navajo home) and spent three days observing their lives and hearing their stories. We also spent time with the Indian Health Service in Chinle, AZ, interviewing doctors on the health and environmental challenges that the Navajo community faces. We devoted an entire day to the Navajo Tribal Utility Authority, the tribal entity responsible for electrification efforts on the reservation, visiting remote families with off-grid power solutions. We finished our trip with a series of cultural events and attended the “Sheep is Life” festival in Tsaile, observed the beginning of an Enemy Way ceremony, visited the infamous flea market and local artisans in Gallup, NM, and hiked to Canyon de Chelly’s White House Ruins.

In the field with the NTUA.

Over the next few weeks, we will release our stories and publish our workshops in a blog series devoted to CataCAMP’s results. Each attendee designed two workshops prior to CataCAMP and had 60 minutes to deliver it to the group and 30 minutes to collect feedback. The revised workshops are being published as part of Catapult’s desire to contribute to the social impact design knowledge space. Every day we receive emails from people interested in our work, and who want to know how to do what we do. Without the ability to hire people, this is the next best thing we can offer – workshops for anyone and everyone to download, experiment with, and use to build their own internal research methods and understanding of the design process.

We welcome feedback and ideas from the public! And finally, we want to thank our generous hosts for inviting our team into their homes and for leaving us with a memorable and enriching experience.

By Heather | Posted in Recent Blogs | Tagged CataCAMP | Comments (0)

June 25, 2010 - By Emily Eisenhart

“The Rest Saving the West:” Design for the First World Competition

A week from now a design competition will come to a close. Unlike most social impact design contests, this model is all about gathering the best design ideas from the developing world so as to help the developed world. Simple idea, but a powerful concept.

Interaction Designer Carolina Vallejo, a native of Bogotá, Colombia, first thought of this competition idea as a design student at NYU. When asked to create a “social design” project for the developing world in one week and without any context, she was extremely put off. She thought, “Why would you assume you can design something to solve a problem for the so called Third World – a world you don’t know – in a week?”

In response to the assignment, Vallejo decided to create the first ever 2010 International Year of the First World in Need. Her intention: to break down the assumption that the people of developing world have nothing substantive to give. In doing so, she hoped to help others recognize and value cultural diversity, to expand the decision-making playing field and to grant agency. She wanted to give others, those who are more often than not the audience, a voice.

Design for the First World Competition (Dx1W) is “a competition for designers, artists, scientists, makers and thinkers in developing countries to provide solutions for First World problems.” Participants are currently submitting ideas to redesign the future of the First World. Dx1W has identified four main areas to address:

1) Food Production and Eating Disorders (e.g. reducing obesity)
2) Aging population and Low Birth rate (e.g. family planning, access to health care)
3) Immigration and Integration to Society (e.g. integrating the immigrant population)
4) Sustainability and Over consumption (e.g. reducing consumption rate of mass-produced goods)

So, what makes this model so different? For decades, the flow of presumed innovation has traveled from the developed world to the developing world – from the so-called First World to the Third World. Critique of such solutions (those which are dropped in from the outside) – from parachute design to systems of international aid – is not new. For as long as there’s been an international development industry, there have been critiques like Barbara Harrell-Bond and David Rieff.

Speaking as a developing world citizen now living in the developed world, Vallejo laments, “We’ve created a culture that relies on aid and we (and them) often discard our responsibility in improving our present conditions and shaping a better future.” The future of the world is for all of us to help build. In creating this competition, Vallejo is not insisting that well-intentioned efforts in the developing world cease – there are many very important endeavors currently underway to help solve the needs of communities the world over. She is simply asking that we try to break down the traditional, pervasive “Us vs. Them” paradigm in the aid and design work focused on the developing world.

A $1,000 prize is attached to the winning idea, which is “intended to support designers whose entries reflect systems thinking, sustainability, accessibility, materials exploration, technology, and cultural relevance.”

It’s a fascinating contest that is sure to get people talking. Ultimately, though, it’s worth asking what the ultimate purpose is. Is the contest meant to simply get people thinking differently, or is it actually meant to enable the creation of interesting new ideas? And if it’s the latter, does this contest suffer from the same presumptions about how one group of people can know what would be good for another?

Regardless, we’re excited to see how this contest plays out. It’ll particularly informative for design firms like Catapult, who are working in this space.

Do you think the Rest has something to teach the West? If so, there’s still one week to get involved. Submit your ideas by the contest deadline: July 1, 2010 11:59 pm EST. To be eligible, you must be at least 13 years of age and a legal resident of a developing nation. For more information, visit the contest site: www.designforthefirstworld.com.

By Emily Eisenhart | Posted in Recent Blogs | Comments (0)

June 1, 2010 - By Heather

Technology, design, innovation, Africa: an on-the-ground perspective

Investors and potential investors in Africa gathered in Dar es Salaam in early May for the World Economic Forum on Africa. Joining the forum were African government officials representing nearly every African nation, finance investors from China, India, the US and Europe, as well as non-profits, NGOs, and social entrepreneurs. In the opening session, Tanzanian President Kikwete expressed his desire to propel agricultural growth, but the hot topics also included multinational investment in Africa, energy infrastructure, women entrepreneurship, and building social leaders. The rallying cry: let’s stop talking about Africa’s “potential” and start building successful case studies.

The World Economic Forum tagline is “Committed to improving the state of the world.” To me that requires tackling big issues like poverty and inequality through environmentally sustainable development. The driving factors to achieving environmental sustainability? The use and design of technology. Empowering women. Supporting local innovation.

I was privileged to speak with a few individuals addressing these issues in Africa as policy makers, entrepreneurs, and non-profit organizations. I asked each of them, “Tell me about innovation, design, women and/or technology in Africa.” Here are some of their responses.

Nick Moon

Co-founder and Managing Director of Kickstart, a non-profit organization developing and marketing new technologies that are bought by local entrepreneurs and used to establish new small businesses.

“Very little work, in terms of design, innovation, technology in Africa, is being done for the people at the very bottom of the economic pyramid. It’s generally assumed that somehow or another miniaturized or minimalized version of high-tech developed for wealthy economies will somehow trickle down to bottom the pyramid. I think that’s totally the wrong approach. Because these consumers are in such a different set of social, economic and emotional circumstances that they require technology solutions to be developed specifically to meet those circumstances. And so it’s a completely different field. Going further, it’s probably more true that we can upscale small or low-tech solutions we develop for the BOP so that they have the potential for trickling down into wealthy economies.”

Bruce McNamer

CEO of Technoserve, a non-profit providing business advice and access to both markets and capital to businesspeople in developing countries.

“I think increasing opportunity for women in business, intersecting that with technology, as well as increasing possibilities in distribution, and diffusion of innovation, not just for women, but all entrepreneurs, is necessary. To attempt this years ago – to have the design tools and finance for business – was too costly. And so the developing world always ended up as a recipient. But now we’re building a middle class, the most rapidly growing consumer sector, which creates a strong market for products. This is the best opportunity for development.”

Kevin Martin

Acumen Fund Fellow working with d.Light, a low-cost solar lantern company providing lighting to families in developing countries.

“Africa’s challenges do not exist in silos: the prevalence of HIV/AIDS, for instance, is a function of culture, history, and economy as well as a dozen other factors. Challenges such as these require holistic solutions which integrate the on-the-ground-reality faced by the continent. I believe that the confluence of human centered design and modern technology is the most powerful tool the world has for generating the innovative solutions required to overcome these challenges.”

Jason Morenikeji

Project Director of The Clean Energy Company, building sustainable wind power solutions in Mozambique.

“There is this concept of African innovation which you see, especially in Mozambique, every time you go to a garage. I’ll see a piece of equipment, welding machines, bits of metal and wound wire and it blows me away sometimes. But innovation always comes from a specific need that’s inherent and if you bring that need from outside then it gets too convoluted in the way it’s translated. It almost has to happen itself over time. So in terms of bringing innovation and new design concepts, it takes time on the ground to see how things work and you have to adapt what you’re bringing to the African innovation process.”

By Heather | Posted in Recent Blogs | Comments (2)

May 5, 2010 - By Morgan

Sketching experience

Recently I’ve started learning to sketch. Like many, I was told at some point in school that art might not be my forte, and from then on semi-consciously dropped any artistic interests I might have otherwise pursued. And while it may be true that I am not on track to paint impressionist watercolors, sketching accurately is more of a skill you develop than something you either have or don’t. As far as I know, the same is true of most of those mysterious “creative” things we’re told we could never be good at – a topic for another time, but if you’re interested, one place to start is with Carol Dweck’s research on mindset. Anyways, though I come from a social science/philosophy background, I’ve been floating around design for a few years now, and have run out of good excuses for not being able to draw my ideas on the proverbial napkin.

So I tote my little notebook everywhere now, and use my spare time on the train, in between meetings, or while waiting for water to boil to sketch out anything around me. Now, though I’m proud of my tiny improvements, this post isn’t meant to be about how much fun it is to draw.

Rather, the other day I was trying to draw a book I had lying on the table [instead of actually reading it...]. In the beginning, I’d check the book after every line or curve, measuring out angles and proportions with my pencil. After I got the basics down, I started getting a bit sloppy. I’d go two or three steps before glancing back at my subject, and I’d skip the quick measurements in the interest of time. The initial proportions were great. The later ones, not so much.

It’s the exact same in design. Most designers will faithfully go through the initial research process, dutifully collecting insights, making videos, and observing needs in action. But in many projects, financial and time considerations can force designers to the sticky notes and studio, emerging only many prototypes later to check their ideas with people out-in-the-world. And the same thing can happen – the metaphorical proportions are off, insights have been mistranslated, or ideas have been lost in the process of moving through too many other brains.

In an ideal world, those who would experience the design would be included in nearly every stage of the process – in research for insights, possibly in synthesis to have their perspective included in frameworks, during high-level design to confirm the general outline, and then in various iterations down to the detailed, nearly-final design to check whether that button is in the right place and right color. Given that, I’m also a realist, and I understand the constraints we all operate under – that process is extremely expensive and rarely possible. There’s also a strong argument to be made for keeping the audience from having too much direct influence over a design, given how rare it is for any of us to consciously be able to state our deep needs and desires. That being said, it’s not bad to aspire to an ideal, and keep in mind that the more we return to our subjects in some form, the more accurate our final creations.

By Morgan | Posted in Recent Blogs | Comments (0)

April 25, 2010 - By Heather

Catapult heads to the Navajo Nation

Six Catapult team members head to Northern Arizona in June to participate in what we’re lovingly calling “CataCAMP: Catapult Design Cultural and Anthropological Methods Program.” It’s a time to learn and share new skills, cultivate our field work methods, and build relationships on the Navajo Reservation. The Navajo Nation is the largest reservation in the United States in terms of people and land mass. It currently covers 26,000 square miles and is home for 180,462 Navajos according to the 2000 census. The Navajo Nation has landed in the news most recently with its government initiative to create green jobs and its $32 million project to outfit the reservation with high-speed internet. Despite these initiatives, approximately 40% of Navajos live without electricity and still haul water to their homes, the unemployment rate lingers at 50%, and per capita income is less than $8000.

During our one-week stay, we’ll be staying with rural host families, engaging in cultural activities and ceremonies, and visiting the Navajo Tribal Utility Authority, responsible for electrifying the reservation. We’ll also be working on further developing our field skills, including: energy and water usage and assessment, community health assessment, facilitating focus groups, cultural research methods, participatory design, etc.

To learn more about CataCAMP, or if you’re interested in supporting this program, please email heather(at)catapultdesign(dot)org. We’re also welcoming visits with more organizations (non-profit, government entities, etc) during our stay. Stay tuned for more updates!

By Heather | Posted in Latest News, Uncategorized | Comments (0)

April 8, 2010 - By Emily Eisenhart

Re-imagining educational environments

I recently learned about two very interesting projects – both of which have been implemented, successfully, in the past 2-5 years – when reading the book “Design Revolution: 100 Products that Empower People” by Emily Pilloton and Allan Chochinov.

The two products, which were designed for educational (classroom, recess) environments, are 1) the “Max” chair and 2) the Playground Fence. Both products exist to solve a problem, and in doing so, fill a need. Neither of the products are present in developing countries, but both products were created within a similar ethnographic framework that is human-centered (that focuses on the end user) and that uses participant observation – watching closely in the classroom, paying attention to how students sit in or tilt their chairs; and engaging on the playground, paying attention to how students treat – and interact (or don’t) with – barriers to their playspace.

The “Max” chair was a project thought up by Tom Wates, a British math and physical education instructor. The chair’s purpose? To get kids to stop clowning around in class! Wates designed a chair that is physically impossible to tip over backwards (trying hard, one can only tilt it a few centimeters!).

In a 2008 interview, Wates told Reuters, “The reason I went into it was because of the irritation of children leaning back…You would get into the flow of the lesson, the kid would fall off the chair, everyone would laugh and you would have to start again.” At Wates’ school, and in many schools in Britain, students would tip traditional chairs back so far they would often tumble over, causing injury to that student (each year, as many as 7,000 British children go to the hospital for injuries related to this type of fall) and a major disruption to the flow of classroom lessons and activities.

The chair is designed primarily for safety, but along with that comes additional benefits. By changing the design of the chair itself, Wates was able to diminish the frequency of reprimands. The most recent version of the chair – black in color – is made out of recycled plastic, so it is increasingly durable and offers a low carbon footprint (the chair also comes in five other colors). The chair is ergonomically designed for safety and comfort (it provides lower back support, encouraging good posture), and in four different sizes, any student – young or old – can find it useful and beneficial. [The chair costs about $30 USD].

The “Playground Fence” was designed by Dutch designers Tejo Remy and Rene Veenhuizen. In 2004, they were commissioned to re-design and transform the playground at De Noorderlicht primary school in the Netherlands. In taking on this project, Remy and Rene had their sights set on something that would “add” to the space without adding any new materials. The addition they hoped to make was one that would be inspiring, would encourage collaboration and interaction, and that would be useful.

Minimalist but effective in their solution, they took note of the pieces in the existing playground – the play structures, the floor, and the fence that enclosed the playspace. The fence particularly captured their attention. What was initially built as a “barrier” (two-dimensional: inside vs. outside), could be reinterpreted as a “gateway” or “portal” and become an interactive form, facilitating the coming together of people and ideas (three-dimensional: inside vs. outside vs. within). They re-designed the fence to have nooks, crannies, seats, benches, playspaces, and more. The fence went from being entrapping to being inviting. The re-vamped fence design encouraged exploration and new experiences. It became a part – in fact an integral piece – of the playspace and playground, not simply the structure that enclosed it. Intrigued students can use such spaces to continue conversations, to play make-believe, to interact with parents or individuals outside of the fence (safely). The playground is an important learning environment for students, and increased opportunity for interaction and exploration can be a beneficial addition to the standard subjects taught in school.

What you can see from these two products is that with some participation, some observation, some research and a bit of imagination, you can recreate critical educational environments, furthering the opportunity for better, safer, more engaging learning and playing experiences.

By Emily Eisenhart | Posted in Recent Blogs | Comments (1)

April 4, 2010 - By Heather

Pulling the plug on social ventures

“How do you know when to pull the plug on your idea?” That’s the question Kiwanja.net’s Ken Banks posed to me after swapping stories one afternoon about our respective startup organizations. Nurturing and implementing ideas demands a level of physical and emotional investment. Once you’ve put that much into it, it becomes hard to know when it’s appropriate to throw in the towel.

The lack of financial capital isn’t a concession factor for most social ventures. Successful social ventures were born before the availability of seed funding for these ideas, and some of the coolest new organizations out there are funded by friends and family. For these organizations there is no drain of funds that signifies the death of an idea. When organizations are fueled by personal capital and sweat equity, the finish line gets hazy.

It’s an increasing dilemma. Consider the growing number of student classes working on social impact design projects. Stanford University’s Design for Extreme Affordability is one of the more renowned programs for graduate students in design, engineering, and business that connects student teams with a non-profit “client” for five months to develop a product solution serving the needs of bottom of the pyramid consumers. The class is responsible for spinning out a variety of social entrepreneurs – Ignite Innovations, d.light, Embrace, Driptech, to name a few. Each of these organizations came into existence because their “client” was unwilling or unable to take the final idea forward. Five months of work wasted? It’s not hard to see why many student teams decide to implement the solutions themselves.

In addition to student teams, there are thousands of individuals and groups out there with ideas, solutions, or prototypes. Each often building new organizations to support their solutions, some with more concrete plans than others. The problem arises after these teams/individuals/groups develop a solution, but then become unsure what to do with it. Solutions, after all, still need to be implemented. Roadblocks prohibit these organizations from getting their solutions into the hands of people who need them. The usual culprits: lack of funding, on-the-ground presence or implementation partner, or the time and motivation required to drive activity.

A great case in point is the Pepper Eater, a device produced by Samuel Hamner and Scott Sadlon. Their aluminum prototype uses a hand crank to crush chili peppers into chili flakes. The prototype processes one kilogram of dried peppers in about thirty minutes, a fraction of the time required to do it by hand. The women in Ethiopia who’ve field-tested seem to like it, and have even purchased the prototypes.

But the designers behind the project are not ready to quit their day jobs to make pepper grinders. They’re not interested in the complexities of building a company around this technology – they just want to see it end up in the hands of people that can and will. But funders don’t give money to ideas without implementers. Investors don’t fund ideas without a foreseeable return. As a result, the Pepper Eater sits in development purgatory waiting for something to happen.

How to help them? The only thing I could think of was to feature them in this blog to let everyone reading it know that they’re looking for partners to manufacture and distribute the design in Ethiopia. (Any takers?) But it brings back the core issue Ken Banks raised in our conversation: how do you know if you’re forcing an idea? And is there a place for the solutions that don’t make is past the roadblocks?

The irony is that a lot of people with ideas or interest in this field are asking how to get started. My answer for folks is usually fuzzy and unhelpful, but the most forthright answer I’ve heard came from Sally Osberg of the Skoll Foundation. She said, “If you’re asking that question, then you’re not ready. Get some experience, learn from those who are doing, and put yourself out there.” It’s true. But now that we have many people getting started, the harder question to answer is: how do you know when to stop?

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This post also appears on NextBillion.net, a community of business leaders, social entrepreneurs, NGOs, policy makers and academics who want to explore the connection between development and enterprise.

By Heather | Posted in Recent Blogs | Comments (1)

March 25, 2010 - By Morgan

Rethinking “happiness”

A recent New Yorker article takes on the rather popular topic of happiness. Positive psychology has been growing as a trend in the U.S. for a while now, as has popular interest in behavioral sciences as a guiding force – if you’re in doubt, just check out your local bookstore’s display of nonfiction bestsellers. The article in question brings up a number of interesting findings for the work we do and for societal organizing principles in general. Among them: economic growth is not always convincingly linked with happiness, poor people are not necessarily much more dissatisfied than rich people, people adapt to improved circumstances, people don’t necessarily know what will make them happy, etc. These ideas are pretty common lately, floating around everything from TED talks to self-help books, and many major religions have been promoting some variation of the “money is not equal to happiness” equation for millenia.

So what does that mean for development, for Catapult’s mission of serving impoverished communities? An implicit thread running through the research suggests that much of international economic development may be focused more on satisfying the needs and reactions of the people helping than the communities supposedly being helped. Not a new issue in nonprofit work – there’s a continual societal questioning of whether someone’s really giving or working or helping to satisfy their own needs for guilt alleviation or pride or meaning, whether any work is truly altruistic, whether aid is imposed on communities, whether there are unintended consequences. These ideas are behind much of the modern movement for participatory development, for listening to the needs of various stakeholders, for human-centered processes.

There’s of course a broader issue here though. A friend of mine once said that she doesn’t really see the point of international development – we’re not all that happy with all of our stuff, so why should we assume that other people will be? What right do we even have to think we know the course that a society should take? There are a range of questions here: health advances can lead to longer lives, but are they better lives? What cultural practices and advantages are inherently lost through globalization/modernization? Is it really possible to do development work in such a sensitive and thoughtful way as to make sure that it’s sustainable, maintains cultural practices, and skirts our own pitfalls? In the end if we do it all perfectly, will anyone even be happy for it? Or will everyone forget a few generations after that there was ever such global poverty, and focus instead on a new version of inequality or a new goal to strive for?

Of course, there are a number of possible answers here, and I’m not necessarily committed to any single one of them. You can challenge the research – a great deal of it is based on direct surveys, which can be subject to all sorts of cultural issues – how do people interpret happiness, will people self-report accurately, will they report honestly, are there social pressures that distort answers, etc. You could say, like the New Yorker does, that happiness might be besides the point. While a certain brand of happiness is part of the American dream, it’s not necessarily every culture’s goal. Lots of different people feel there are lots of different purposes to life, and not all of them include happiness. Some like passion, some like serenity, some like service of a higher calling, some prefer pure variety of experience. Or, you could argue that only after basic needs are satisfied do people even have the luxury of worrying about whether to pursue happiness or some other goal. The literature does show that people subject to extreme trauma or lack of basic needs are indeed dissatisfied, and beyond that, as Jacqueline Novogratz of Acumen Fund argues, development can aim to bring people to a point where obstacles are removed, and they can feel free to make choices and pursue lives of dignity – even if they may not automatically do those things. We could see development as related to maslow’s hierarchy on a societal level – only after the entire group’s basic needs are satisfied can the whole society move to consider esteem, love, self-actualization. Another approach is to try to increase the efficiency of the happiness generated – for some thoughts on this idea, check out the New Economics Foundation Happy Planet Index.

Further philosophical debates can riff on those themes still – do people ever really make choices, what do subjective feelings even matter, in the long run…and so forth. At which point, like many people, you could just follow your heart, your gut, your anger, whatever guiding emotional compass works. I’m neutral on most of these arguments, so I’d be curious to hear how others have dealt with these internal and external debates.

By Morgan | Posted in Recent Blogs | Comments (4)

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