Formo Hay, Audun (2023) Acting on Emotions: Designing with the relational dramas in welfare systems. Contexts – The Systemic Design Journal, 2. ISSN 27040542

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Abstract

As welfare systems worldwide face increasing pressures, there is a growing need for actionable approaches to transform them into more adaptable and sustainable forms. Service design is suggested to support such transformations. While early service design focussed on experiences, it has recently adopted systemic perspectives to address the complex interrelations among actors in service systems. However, this shift has neglected how these relations are experienced emotionally by the actors involved. Since emotions are integral to how actors understand, navigate and form agency, overlooking them can hinder service design’s ability to support welfare systems transform into more adaptable forms.

This research aimed to integrate experiential and systemic perspectives in service design to support actors in transforming complex welfare systems. To explore this, a transdisciplinary research-by-design study was conducted. Drawing on recent service design research and relational sociology, the study was informed by the concept of emotional reflexivity and a service ecosystem design framework. Situated within the Norwegian child welfare system, this research involved over 100 system actors. Systems oriented design and theatre practices were used to facilitate emotional reflexivity among system actors about the complex, and sometimes difficult, relational dynamics they were embedded within. The four-month collaboration culminated in an interactive theatre event involving 800 participants, followed by facilitated conversations among system actors.

By focussing on diverse emotional experiences within the child welfare system, three pairs of propositions for incorporating emotions into systemic approaches to service design were developed: 1) adopting a systemic view of emotions, 2) mirroring emotions to support reflexivity, and 3) facilitating conversations about emotional tensions. We discuss the implications of these propositions for practice and theory and how they can advance systemic approaches to service design within complex welfare systems.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	service design, service ecosystem design, systems oriented design, welfare systems, reflexivity, emotions, theatre
Divisions:	Faculty of Design
DOI:	10.58279/v2005
Date Deposited:	10 Nov 2026 20:51
Last Modified:	10 Nov 2026 21:00
URI:	https://openresearch.ocadu.ca/id/eprint/5218

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