Empowering Whole-Community Co-Creation

In June 2025, seven studios from the Reach Network contributed stories and reflections on the engagements they have had with system transformations. Our journey into system transformation revealed a fundamental truth: it’s about looking beyond isolated problems to understand interconnected challenges. For those designing solutions, this means shifting from fixing individual parts to engage with the system as a whole. For everyone, it’s about asking: What are the hidden connections, and how do changes ripple through the whole? Working systemically demands a particular way of thinking. It's about embracing curiosity, humility, and a willingness to collaborate across diverse perspectives. We observed the value of going broad in our understanding before diving deeper into specific areas. One helpful analogy that emerged was that of a gardener, nurturing growth and working with natural systems rather than simply trying to fix broken elements.

Integrating new technologies like AI into our daily lives and work is not a new concept. In our Reach School sessions in 2024, we have engaged in multiple conversations about AI. We believe it is our responsibility to understand what efforts are needed to create meaningful, positive, and humane ways of utilizing AI, around the world.

In our network, we encourage everyone to bring forward topics they find important for discussion. Recently, three studios from India, the Netherlands, and Mexico collaborated to invite us to reflect on the decolonization of design. This conversation is particularly relevant to our practice as design researchers.