Author : Gauthier Roussilhe
Gauthier Roussilhe is a designer and writer. Keenly interested in the notion of personal responsibility, he recently made a documentary entitled "Ethics for Design" that examines the current state of design practices in Europe and attempts to comprehend the ethical dimension of design. Gauthier is currently studying design at Goldsmiths, University of London, where he specialises in public policy design: working with citizens, civil servants and elected representatives to create better services.
What is Europe made of ? Nothing, unquestionably. It is a political subject governing a non-existent body; a lid without the saucepan. So what is it made of, this lid that covers nothing but itself? It was founded on the well-intentioned belief that peace would be guaranteed if we multiplied exchanges, notably on economic matters. This is a somewhat Lévi-Straussian discourse that considers war, above all, as exchange that goes wrong: maximise exchange, therefore, and we prevent war. But in the societies studied by the anthropologist, the value of the exchanged object was rarely determined by economic circumstances or production, but rather by socio-cultural ...