This paper explores how “the public” is understood and imagined, by government and policy makers who are increasingly interested in design as a way to develop and deliver public services. The papers looks to provide public administration practitioners and scholars with a better understanding of the role of publics in design, and academics and practitioners in design a better understanding of how the publics are understood in public administration. Public Administration has dominated Public Value since the 1990’s, therefore the paper focuses on this area, from Moore’s pragmatism authorising environment (Moore 2014), to Bozeman normative accounts of universal values (Bozeman and Johnson 2014). While there is no consensual view, they suggest a tendency to see a public as: “out there”; arriving at a settled view; ignoring the way it is shaped and contested by different interest groups. The paper asks how tendencies might shape our understanding of the complex sets of organisations operating in this space. Here the narrative draws on Fraser (2007) who asks, what accounts of what a functioning democracy should be, make seem normal. In doing so the narrative draws in work that destabilises notions of the public, in favour of the plurality of “counter publics” (Negt and Kluge [1993] 2016; Warner 2002), suggesting a need to move away from seeing the public as “out there waiting”, to a reading of publics as being addressed and brought into being (Hauser and Beniot-Barne 2002). Finally the paper suggests we need to investigate how the public as imagined in Public Value shapes the use of design. Suggesting a need to look at how design brings its publics into being, in particular how participatory design, critical design (Di Salvo 2012) can make a contribution to developing a pluralistic and participatory understanding of the public. The paper closes with the suggesting contradictions are useful, as speculations on real and imagined publics are a crucial part of designerly way of knowing.

1. Design and its Publics
Ronald Macintyre
@roughbounds
Cite as: Macintyre R (2018) Design and its Publics, International Research
Society for Public Management: Creating and Co-Creating Value in Public Service
Delivery, Edinburgh, Scotland, 11th -13th of April 2018, CC BY SA 4.0

2. Structure
• Open Education
• Open Education as a Public Good?
• Open Education and its Publics
• The Reality of Design Work with Volunteer Scotland
• Conclusion

3. OPEN EDUCATION

4. OpenLearn
Source: Patrina Law (Head of Free Learning) The Open University, “10 Years of OpenLearn”, April 2016

5. What do we mean by OEP?
We think of Open Educational Practices as those
educational practices that are concerned with and promote
equity and openness. Our understanding of ‘open’ builds
on the freedoms associated with “the 5 Rs” of OER,
promoting a broader sense of open, emphasising social
justice, and developing practices that open up
opportunities for those distanced from education.

6. OPEN EDUCATION AS A PUBLIC
GOOD?

7. What do we mean by OEP?
We think of Open Educational Practices as
those educational practices that are
concerned with and promote equity and
openness. Our understanding of ‘open’ builds
on the freedoms associated with “the 5 Rs” of
OER, promoting a broader sense of open,
emphasising social justice, and developing
practices that open up opportunities for
those distanced from education.
The P in OEP?
… Practice
… Participation
… the public

8. Is Open Education as a Public
Good?
In economics a public good is non excludable and non rivalrous, so knowing can
be a public good but education is often a mix of public and private
Expressions of Education as Public Good within the rhetoric around Open
Education are expressions of a set of values

9. Is Open Education as a Public
Good?
A
What
A
Who
Design
Who is “The
Public” in Open
Education?

10. Is Open Education as a Public
Good?
A
What
A
Who
Design
Exceptions Aside
…The Public, the who
of Open Education are
well educated
professionals … “the
educational haves”
(Cannell and
Macintyre 2017)

11. OPEN EDUCATION AND ITS
PUBLIC

12. Locating “the public”
In the review … Public Value … “the public” as …
• out there acting as an authorising environment …
(Moore 1995)
• “The Public Sphere” (Habermas [1962] 1991), see
also Bennington (2009)
• having formed or formable views which one can
treat as normative (Bozeman 2008)
• a useful fiction we hold inside (Meynhardt 2009)
• Questions of participation are questions of equity
(Dahl and Soss 2014),
Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, Vol XXV, January-June 1829, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_19th-
century_British_periodicals#/media/File:Blackwood%27s_Edinburgh_Magazine_XXV_1829.jpg, Public
Domain

13. Locating “other” publics
Alternatively… “the public” as …
called into being through being addressed
(Hauser 2007, Warner 2002),
Realised and imagined… (Di Salvo 2012)
Promotional Still Citizen Kane, 1941,
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Citizen-Kane-Welles-Podium.jpg , Public
Domain

14. Locating “other” publics
… an alternate reading … “the public” as …
having questions of legitimacy how inclusive and
participatory, and efficacy, how well civil society
can mobilise and realise “the public” (Fraser
2007)
The Public Sphere, Frederic Sorrieu lithograph from
1848 commemorating universal male suffrage in
France entitled “Suffraege universal dedie a Ledru-
Rollin, Public Domain

15. Locating “other” publics
In the review … an alternate reading … “the public”
as …
A site of contestation, with counter publics, a need
for a plural reading (Negt and Kluge [1993] 2016;
Laclau and Mouffe ([1985] 2014)
Macintyre 2018, Anti Gun protest Santa Fe, New
Mexico, 24th of March 2018, CC BY SA 4.0

16. THE REALITY OF DESIGN WORK
WITH VOLUNTEER SCOTLAND

17. Volunteer Scotland.
The Education Team at a
workshop on the 17th of
January 2018
Group Work First Design Workshop at Volunteer Scotland, Stirling, 17th
of January 2018, Ronald Macintyre CC BY SA 4.0

18. We Start with the value
you want to create for the
learner and/or your
organisation rather than
what you know (or think
learners ought to know)
and how you think we
ought to communicate
VALUE How What
Hand Up! First Design Workshop at Volunteer Scotland, Stirling, 17th of
January 2018, Ronald Macintyre CC BY SA 4.0

19. Calling a Public into Being
• Starts with the Learner, use of
data to profile learner – e.g front
line care staff, possibly distanced
from education, unfamiliar with
learning online
• Build a journey based on their
needs, think about where they
are, their context, experience,
where they want to go
• Builds on the resources and
capabilities you bring and/or want
to develop – strategic and
operational alignment
What
Learners
Want
Resources
and
Capabilities
of the
Organisation
The
learner
Journey

20. Exploring Learners Journeys
Drawing a “rich picture”
• “Rich Pictures” are a way to capture issues and
relationships that can be difficult to put into
words
• You don’t need to be able to draw, and people
should “share the pen”
• Try to come to a shared view, note differences
of view
• The discussion about what you might draw is
just as important as the drawing.
Ideal Crofting Learner, SFC Workshop,
Kyle of Lochalsh, 15th of October 2015,
Ronald Macintyre CC BY SA 4.0

21. Exploring Learners Journeys
Draw out an “rich picture” of your “ideal”
learner
• Think about the learner, who are they at the
start of the journey
• Who are they at the end, what is it they are
able to do
• Think about the value realised by the learner
and the organisation.
More Group Work First Design Workshop at Volunteer Scotland, Stirling,
17th of January 2018, Ronald Macintyre CC BY SA 4.0

22. Themes from the Ideal Learner Pictures
• Diverse backgrounds and experiences,
• Recognise problems they need to solve
• Willing to learn, and willing to learn from
each other
• Be able to apply the learning within their
context
• Recognise learning is a journey that does
not stop at the end of the course
• Continue to support others after the course
is finished
• Be advocates for volunteering within the
organisation,
• Promote Volunteer Scotland and its values
The Ideal Learner, Volunteer Scotland, Stirling, 17th of January 2018,
Ronald Macintyre CC BY SA 4.0

23. “The Public” they presently call into being
The same exercise picturing your actual learners:
• Geographically clustered around the central belt
• Tend to be in large organisations that can pay
• A spectrum from the dominant “hand up” to the
non contributor
• Some get spooked by the formal procedures
• People form into “wee groups”
Ideal
Learner
Actual
Learners
The
learner
Journey

24. Exploring Learning Journeys
Traditional SSM Learner Centred
C/B – Originally Customer later
beneficiaries
Who are the learners? Learners are not customers in any normal sense,
in open education the question is who is “your public”?
A – who are the main actors Actors, who is around them, helping create the content, supporting the
learner, what is around them, think about the socio-material/technical
context.
Activities, what is the nature of the activities, where and with what or
whom
T – Transformation Process What is it they will be able to do in the world at the end of the journey
W – Worldview What is the worldview, does it represent/challenge particular positions or
sets of values
O/V – Owners, later also to
include victims
Who is are all those affected
E – Environment What is the wider context in which this sit?

25. Exploring Learning Journeys
Learner Centred
SSM
Volunteer Scotland
Who are the
learners, who is “your
public”?
Tension between the ideal and the actual learner, reflecting organisational tension between “the public” they presently serve as the
“national centre for volunteering” and the one they want to serve.
Actual Public
• At present the actual learner relates to a long term strategic focus on large organisations often with named people/positions who
look after volunteers.
• The learners from larger organisations are practitioners often with little support from the organisation, which is why the come to
VS.
• The focus on them relates to relates to the market for courses, these are the only organisations that can pay, a sense that this is
what they have always done, and the expectation of funders in this case the Scottish Government.
• In evoking the actual learner participants “speak for” them, and from their own experience in these organisations, as a public it is
more than the organisational norms but often deeply personal and tied to professional identity
Imagined Public
• Ideally learners come from a diverse range of backgrounds, in particular they want to engage in informal volunteering,
• Informal volunteering is increasing due for a number of reasons, top down Scottish Government policy, and bottom up anti-
austerity.
• It is also under threat through formalising pressures, would VS intervention help?
• Ideal learners emerged from the organisations own review of its own values, but is contentious, as it cuts across personal and
professional identities.

26. Exploring Learning Journeys: Exercise 2
• The ideal learner tells us a great deal
about the values of the organisation and
the resources and capabilities of the
organisation –often a mix of what we are
good at, and what we wish we were good
at
• The actual learner tells us a similar story
• [often] both highlight the limits of our
knowledge about learners needs and
wants
Ideal
Learner
Actual
Learners
The
learner
Journey
I have found … is this true for you

27. Exploring Learning Journeys: Exercise 2
• It is Obvious …. “Listen”, …. but more
than listen allow “the public” to take
part, participatory process …
• [However] for many Voluntary Sector
organisations their learning materials
are a set of values whose role is as an
act of persusasion
Ideal
Learner
Actual
Learners
The
learner
Journey
OEP, from Public to Participation

28. CONCLUSION

29. Speculating on Design and its
Public(s)
• Education design involves imagining “a public” into
being in order to realise the learner in the design
process
• Care needs to be taken of how you bring “who” into the
design process;
• We can learn about organisation from how they imagine
and realise their publics.

30. Reflection on Public(s) in the
Voluntary Sector
• Organisational narratives over “who they are for” and
their public plays on questions of value(s).
• The Public as real and imagined is influenced by
different aspect top down, internally resonant, and
bottom up images of “the public”.
• Engaging with a new public, drawing in counter publics
leads tensions, and one needs to take care over what
happens to these publics once folded into more formal
structures.

31. Centre for Voluntary Sector Leadership
The Open University Business School
The Open University
Walton Hall
Milton Keynes
MK7 6AA
www.open.ac.uk

32. Acknowledgements
• Some of the work presented here would not have been possible
without funding from the Scottish Government for Open
Educational Practices Scotland (OEPS) a programme hosted by
the OU in Scotland, and special thanks to Pete Cannell the
Director of OEPS.
• James Rees and Alessandro Sancino for support and hard
questions
• Adrian Murtagh at Volunteer Scotland for being open and honest
and helping me understand value and values a little better.

33. References
Benington J. (2009) Creating the Public In Order To Create Public Value?, International Journal of Public Administration, 32(3-4), pp. 232-
249
Bozeman, B., 2008. Debate: Public Value Trade-Offs and Methodological Trade-Offs. Public Money and Management, 28(3), pp.135–
136.
Cannell P. Macintyre R. (2017) Free open online resources in workplace and community settings – a case study on overcoming barriers,
Widening Participation and Lifelong Learning, 19(1), pp. 111-122
Dahl, A. & Soss, J., 2014. Neoliberalism for the common good? Public value governance and the downsizing of democracy. Public
Administration Review, 74(4), pp.496–504.
Di Salvo C. (2012) Adversarial Design, MIT Press: MA Cambridge
Dorst, K. & Cross, N., (2001). Creativity in the design process: co-evolution of problem–solution. Design Studies, 22(5), pp.425–437.
Fraser, N. (2007), Transnationalizing the Public Sphere on the Legitimacy and Efficacy of Public Opinion in a Post-Westphalian World.
Theory, Culture & Society, 24(4), pp7-30
Habermas J. ([1962] 1991). The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry into a category of Bourgeois Society. MIT
Press: Cambridge
Hauser, G.A., 2007. Vernacular discourse and the epistemic dimension of public opinion. Communication Theory, 17(4), pp.333–339.
Laclau E., Mouffe C. ([1985] 2014) Hegemony and Socialist Strategy: Towards a Radical Democratic Politics, Verso: London
Meynhardt, T., 2009. Public Value Inside: What is Public Value Creation? International Journal of Public Administration, 32(3–4), pp.192–
219.
Moore M. H. (1995) Creating Public Value: Strategic Management in Government, Harvard University Press: London
Negt O., Kluge A. ([1993] 2016) Public Sphere of Experience: Analysis of the Bourgeois and Proleterian Public Sphere. Verso: London
Warner, M., (2002). Publics and Counterpublics. Public Culture, 14(1), pp.49–90.