Co-design

Co-design is the practice of designing systems, services, or artifacts in collaboration with end-users and affected communities, treating them as equal partners rather than sources of data. It is closely related to participatory design but places greater emphasis on the equality of design authority — the designer and the participant share decision-making power throughout the process. The tradition has roots in Scandinavian workplace democracy and has been adopted in healthcare, urban planning, and technology development. Co-design is distinct from adversarial design in that it seeks mutual agreement rather than structured conflict, though both reject the designer-as-expert model. See also community-based design, which emphasizes local ownership of the design process.\n\n