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The Digital Futures Lab (DFL) is more than an education and outreach program; it also serves as a "future market observatory." This unique function allows researchers to understand and intervene in current market systems by developing and prototyping novel market devices and other forms of market interventions.

Our faculty team actively facilitates and generates innovative research using the DFL as a foundational platform, embracing the concept of research as design, as advocated by Koray Caliskan. This approach allows for a dynamic exploration of market systems and encourages the creation of practical, impactful solutions.

The DFL welcomes research proposals at both the PhD and postdoctoral levels. We are open to collaborating with researchers, those that currently wish to explore design based methods, and those that are new to this approach. Together we will explore the intersection of market systems, sustainability, digitalisation and innovation, incorporating design-led and other participatory approaches.

Research

Key Features of the Future Market Observatory:

  • Innovative Market Interventions: Develop and prototype novel market devices and interventions to understand and improve market systems.
     
  • Research as Design: Embrace a research approach that views market research as a design process, fostering creativity and practical impact.
     
  • Collaborative Research Environment: Provide a collaborative platform for PhD and postdoctoral researchers to explore and develop their ideas.
     
  • Impactful Solutions: Focus on creating solutions that have real-world applications and contribute to sustainable and equitable market systems.
     
  • Participatory Futures: working collaboratively with “problem owners” in imagining desirable futures as part of the market (re)design process.

By integrating research with practical design and market interventions, the DFL's future market observatory aims to contribute to the advancement of market systems that are sustainable, fair, and innovative.