Upcoming Event
Designing Just Futures: Collaborative Practices for Spatial Justice, September 19 & 20, 2024

The Designing Just Futures Summit equips participants to enact meaningful transformations in the built environment by designing with - not for - those most impacted by design decisions.  By bringing together diverse perspectives from architects, designers, community advocates, policymakers, and activists, the summit will explore spatial justice frameworks, share skills, and foster relationships that embody the BSA's mission to champion innovation in the built environment and drive systemic change through deep partnerships. 

What is Design Justice?
‍Design justice reframes conventional design processes to acknowledge that communities most impacted by spatial inequities are also experts who should have decision-making power over the design of their built environments and technologies. It aims to redistribute control and cultivate equitable, community-centered collaborations between professionals and publics. Design justice recognizes that the way we design shapes systems and experiences of oppression or liberation.

What is Spatial Justice?
‍Spatial justice analyzes how histories, policies and systems have inequitably structured access to space along lines of race, class, ability and other social constructs. It exposes the role of the built environment in perpetuating harm or cultivating well-being. Spatial justice frameworks empower critical examination of power dynamics embedded within spatial contexts in order to remedy past injustice, dismantle oppression, and cultivate equitable distribution of resources through place-based solutions and stewardship models determined by impacted communities.

These definitions are starting points for future conversations and are informed by the activists, educators, leaders, and organizations included on the resources page.

The summit content is structured around four key themes, contextualized within Greater Boston: Legacies, Ecologies, Infrastructures & Practices.

The goals of the summit are to explore spatial justice principles within four key themes: Legacies, Ecologies, Infrastructures, and Practices. To bridge theory and practice by demonstrating practical applications of spatial justice concepts. To foster collaborative learning and idea exchange among diverse professionals and community leaders. To equip participants with actionable strategies to implement spatial justice in their work. To build a network of practitioners committed to advancing spatial justice.

How to participate

You can find out more through the BSA website or register to attend the two day summit.