The article, based on a presentation made at Educating Designers for Global Citizenship, UWC Cardiff, in November 2005, questions the role of design and recognises its potential as a tool of social change beyond a profession intended to satisfy the needs of industrial production, beyond local-global considerations and from the context of a country like India. It argues that design schools must enable hybridization of different creative process and facilitate the development of a community social awareness.

Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design (CIID) was founded by Simona Maschi and Heather Martin in August 2006. With an aim to build an international centre of excellence in interaction design and innovation, CIID incorporates three elements –education, research and consultancy– that together explore new thinking in design and technology.

Design, a magnificent advancement tool for any group activity that is focused on social improvement, will find it difficult to point in this direction while we live in an economic system whose main objective consists of obtaining profits for private capital.