About the project

The war in Ukraine has renewed global awareness on the harsh effects of conflict and displacement on a population, especially young people. In order to understand how the consequences of such a situation can be mitigated with social design, SDN partners initiated a research group led by Janka Csernák (MOME). The primary research took place in multiple international locations. Over a week, the team did hands-on field research to gain insights.

The intensive was co-organized by Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design (Innovation Center), Hadassah Academic College, Jerusalem, and the Estonian Academy of Arts in Tallinn. All three institutions delegated tutors and students to create interdisciplinary, international working teams, and shared and synthesized insights gained throughout the process in order to move forward with conceptualization.

Ultimately, what this research aims at is finding ways in which social design can contribute to understanding and making the experience of relocation easier for young refugees, based on data collected in three countries: Hungary, Israel and Estonia. Besides reconsidering the role of social design in crisis mitigation, researchers are developing design tools and applying social research methods to both investigate and intervene in a social problem with complex emotional, economic and political dimensions.

(Photos by Eva-Liisa Kubinyi and Francisco Martínez)