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Universal Design: A new paradigm

By Professor Singapalli Balaram, National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad

What is Universal Design?

Universal Design is not a new style or a new movement in design. It is a design approach, which addresses an increasingly felt human need. Universal Design is also referred often as "Design for All" or "Inclusive Design" and it is clearly different from "Design for the Disabled" or "Exclusive design or design for Special needs".

The idea of Universal Design has been developed in recent years by a group of thinking designers who believed that people with disabilities, older people, etc, should not be segregated from the rest of the society but integrated with it through the physical environment created by designers. All products and services should be usable by all the groups equally. The late Ronald Mace of the U.S.A. was at the core of this group. Being a humanitarian approach, the concept of Universal Design is accepted today all over the world as the most progressive concept in design.

The concept of Universal Design is widely understood today as an approach to creating environments and products that people of all ages and abilities are able to use to the largest extent possible without the need for adaptation or specialised design. Though this approach benefits to maximum degree older people and people with disabilities most of the time, Universal Design benefits every human being to some degree at some point of time.

While in many parts of the world, Universal Design is being paid increasing attention, however, in our part of the world, which we call the "Developing world", designers are required to grapple with so many other pressing issues that Universal Design finds little attention in our professional practice. As a consequence Universal Design education also finds little space in the curriculum of design schools here. The irony is that it is in this part of the world that the majority of the world's population with disabilities lives and it is in this part of the world that the elderly population is rapidly increasing.

Why is Universal Design?

There is no hiding that fact that "Design" is conventionally non-inclusive. Conventional design usually caters to the so-called “normal” people and thus by inadvertent default segregates others. A left-handed person faces difficulty in using a two-wheeler because the controls are designed for the right-handed majority who are considered "normal". He has no choice but to buy a specially made product, which would be considered exclusive and thereby expensive. Thus the disability of the people with disabilities in poorer countries is doubled.

In the chain of society where every citizen is one link, the disabled, elderly, etc, are weak links. Universal Design argues for the importance of wholesomeness and the importance of making through design, the "weak link" in the society as strong as every other part. The attempt is to give at least equal opportunities to all. In this respect, it is a very democratic concept. In the industrialised and relatively wealthy countries, this 'weak link' is merely physical or sensory. It is mainly concerned with people's diminished abilities, either temporary or permanent nature such as impairment, retardation, advanced age, pregnancy and so on. However, in the non-industrialised "majority countries" the weakness is beyond physical disabilities. The weak component in these countries is essentiality social and economic construct, which severely inhibits the equal participation of certain disadvantaged sections of society in public and private life. Poverty 'for example, is the worst disability. So is illiteracy or lack of hygiene.

What is unique about Universal Design for India?

The economic, social and cultural realities of non-industrialised countries such as India affect Dniversal Design in three ways:

1. The prevalence of oppressing sociopolitical and economic realities such as poverty, population pressures, illiteracy and lack of infrastructures call for Universal Design solutions vastly different than those elsewhere in the world.

2. These realities make implementation of universal design extremely difficult in comparison to other places.

3. Since success breeds success and failure breeds failure the very weaknesses as above breed more problems of the disability, sickness-etc., due to malnutrition, inadequate prenatal and post-natal care, inadequate sanitation and hygiene, ignorance of child medication, unsafe and accident prone situations due to back road conditions, and poor industrial environments.

Universal Design therefore needs to be viewed from this angle differently from the perspective of the industrialized countries. Universal Design for majority countries (that is, developing countries) can then be defined as a concept that extends beyond issues of accessibility of the built environment, and covers the social, cultural and economic issues which are major influences in uniting normal or average people and people with different physical, mental or psychological abilities.

A positive way of understanding disabled and such disadvantaged people is to know them as differently or diversely abled people. In this context one can rephrase Universal Design as an "approach that values and celebrates human diversity"

If such becomes our attitudes, the diversity-rich majority countries such as India and China have overwhelming and perhaps un-manageable cases. Design schools, universities and professional designers in these countries have even far greater need for following this new design paradigm shift than the rest of the world. Only then they can be called truly developed and truly progressive.

What are the practicing principles of Universal Design?

In order to help those designers and design students who are appreciative of the relevance of the universal design approach, and wish to follow it in their work, I quote here briefly the seven widely accepted principles of Universal Design practice. These are the principles, which were established by a working group of architects, product designers, engineers and environmental design researchers in the U.S.A. when the whole idea was mooted. These principles must however be understood within the limitations of the industrialized "minority world' or the first world where the disadvantage is merely physical.

A Universal Design declaration states that the principles of universal design may guide a wide range of design disciplines including environments, products and communications. These principles may be applied to evaluate existing designs, guide the design process and educate both designers and consumers about the characteristics of more usable products and environments." Each principle may be explained with an example as below:

Principle one: Equitable use
The design should be useful and marketable to people with diverse abilities.
A simple everyday example is the door knob. A round smooth knob can only be used by young and strong people. Instead, if a design of rubber gripped, lever type knob is introduced, it will benefit all.

Principle two: Flexibility in use
The design should accommodate a wide range of individual preferences and abilities. Good examples are toilets with grab bars and door frames: wide enough for wheel chairs to pass. Elevator switches located at low level can be used by normal adults, children as well as wheelchair users.

Principle three: Simple and interactive use
Use of the design should be easy to understand, regardless of the users experience, knowledge, language skills or current concentration level. For example, the text in any message should be replaced with a picture or icon, which could be understand by illiterate as well as literate people. An embossed picture is even better because then it could communicate even to a blind person.

Principle four: Perceptible information
The design should communicate necessary information effectively to the user regardless of ambient conditions or the users abilities. For example, a label on a drug bottle should have text large enough and enough contrast with the background so people with low vision, elderly people as well as normal people can also read it well. This aspect is extremely vital in critical situations such as drug dosage, emergency instructions, etc.

Principle five: Tolerance for error
The design should minimise hazards and adverse consequences of accidental or unintended actions. For example, the cup should be so designed as not to slip form unsteady hands and should be able to with stand clumsy or erroneous use.

Principle six: Low physical effort
The design should be used efficiently and comfortably and with a minimum of fatigue. For example, replacing the heavy lever type handles and controls with feather touch buttons is friendly design for all.

Principle seven: Size and space for approach and use
"The Design should be appropriate in size and adequate space should be provided for approach, reach, manipulation and use regardless of users, body size, posture or mobility. The principle is very significant in the modern world where all things are getting increasingly miniaturised. Cell phones for example should be designed particularly with this consideration to suite all including people with fat fingers, unsteady hands: fingers with nails, etc.

(Source: North Carolina State University, 1997)

Conclusion

A nation will not be judged by its success in the sciences, technological prowess, and its economic prosperity or even by its vast knowledge base. It will be judged by the way it takes care of its weakest citizens the young, the elderly, the sick and the disabled, the weak links in the chain. A chain is broken -- even if one link in it is broken. India and Indian design has long way to go in this regard, given that it has the world's largest population of disabled persons (70 million) alone, not taking into account the increasing number, of elderly people and others not addressed by designers. It is high time that Indian designers wake up, turn their attention to this most relevant issue of universal design from the present overtly commercial designing of making things only prettier or change for the sake of change.

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