Abstract
This study explores how teaching service design through Product-Service System projects can encourage reflective sociomaterialist learning for Design for Sustainability in the Global South. It analyses 22 Product-Service Systems projects by undergraduate students at a Thai design school to examine how design education, aligned with Thailand’s bio-circular-green (BCG) economy initiative, helps develop students as social agents who drive sustainable innovation. Using ethnographic action research and thematic analysis, six case vignettes illustrate how participatory design methods and systems thinking in Product-Service Systems projects empower students to build sociotechnical systems and offer localized, community-centered solutions. Findings show that integrating Product-Service Systems practices into service design education supports systemic innovation and policy-oriented learning in developing economies. The research advances design theory by linking sociomaterialist approaches, sustainability education, and innovation policy within the Global South context.
Keywords
Design for Sustainability, Service Design, Sociomaterialism, Global South, Reflective Design Education
DOI
https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2026.1704
Citation
Hwangbo, H. (2026) Reflective Sociomaterialist Learning for Design for Sustainability (DfS) in the Global South: Evaluations of Students’ Product Service System (PSS) Design Projects at a Thai Design School, in Simeone, L., Gray, C. M., Verhoeven, A., de Götzen, A., Bakırlıoğlu, Y., Zohar, H., Stead, M., and Buwert, P. (eds.), DRS2026: Edinburgh, 8–12 June, Edinburgh, United Kingdom. https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2026.1704
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Included in
Reflective Sociomaterialist Learning for Design for Sustainability (DfS) in the Global South: Evaluations of Students’ Product Service System (PSS) Design Projects at a Thai Design School
This study explores how teaching service design through Product-Service System projects can encourage reflective sociomaterialist learning for Design for Sustainability in the Global South. It analyses 22 Product-Service Systems projects by undergraduate students at a Thai design school to examine how design education, aligned with Thailand’s bio-circular-green (BCG) economy initiative, helps develop students as social agents who drive sustainable innovation. Using ethnographic action research and thematic analysis, six case vignettes illustrate how participatory design methods and systems thinking in Product-Service Systems projects empower students to build sociotechnical systems and offer localized, community-centered solutions. Findings show that integrating Product-Service Systems practices into service design education supports systemic innovation and policy-oriented learning in developing economies. The research advances design theory by linking sociomaterialist approaches, sustainability education, and innovation policy within the Global South context.