The Task of m21

Notes on our Research and its Mission & Agenda


see m21 Research Questions

  • This research asks how we might develop better ecological guidelines for business and the community
  • From 2007-9 we will see whether metadesign can ‘synergise’ practices of ‘eco-design’.
  • The term ‘metadesign’ has practical potential because it reconciles many specialisms of ‘design’.
  • synergy is equally important because it represents a more positive and attractive alternative to discourse of sustainability.
  • Since the 1990s, synergy was a buzzword within business and management culture.
  • If we can devise suitable ‘Benchmark’ levels, industry would be able to audit its synergy levels within a realistic social, cultural, ecological, and commercial framework.
  • We will define four orders of synergy to help us elicit, monitor, map, and maintain different types of synergies within a single framework.
  • We will interrogate orthodox design and ask how we may achieve a closer and finer-grained discourse, across the different specialist professional practices.