A Systematic Review of Systemic Design Frameworks for Complex Challenges

Abstract

Systemic design has been noted as a promising scaffold to approach the emerging challenges faced by designers in understanding the dynamic and interconnected problems that define contemporary reality. The field can briefly be described as an attempt to integrate systems and design thinking with complexity and solution-oriented methods. While a range of literature on systemic design is available, its defining framework remains elusive and further development is needed to understand and investigate its viability. This article employs a systematic qualitative literature review in order to explore and synthesise existing systemic design mindsets, processes, and methods. The synthesis of frameworks acts to provide greater insight into the orchestration of applying systemic design to complex problems. It concludes by identifying potential challenges and limitations within the field. In particular, a limited investigation of consumer behaviour is present, with more focus given to material and production throughput.