China's New Focus On Design

Beijing wants to produce a new wave of designers who can help China move beyond a manufacturing economy

By Venessa Wong

China has caught up to the U.S. and Western Europe in great swaths of the economy. Yet China's schools lag Western counterparts in teaching "design thinking," or taking the problem-solving process designers use to create products and applying it to the greater tasks of running a business. Many schools still teach design within the framework of fine arts, without a significant nod toward business or other disciplines.

Now the central government is developing a design policy to help China move beyond a manufacturing economy and forward in implementing cross-disciplinary education and bridging left- and right-brained thinking. As in other sectors, schools are beginning to train a new wave of design managers "with Chinese characteristics" who can apply design thinking in a context that fits China's commercial and political landscape.

"With almost a million students studying design in universities, design education is a national issue," says Wang Min, dean of the school of design at China's Central Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA) in Beijing. "Most people don't really know what design can do for them." Min, who was formerly the design director for the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games, adds. "In many places, we still need to promote design and design thinking."

CHANGING COURSE

CAFA is overseen by the Ministry of Education, the central government body that regulates state school curriculum. Since 2004, it has offered a Master's in Design Management and Wang says CAFA is considering forming a partnership with a business school to develop an MBA with a design curriculum. Tsinghua University in Beijing has been working with schools and design organizations around the world to explore innovation, design and management—themes of this year's Tsinghua International Design Management Symposium.

In south-central China, Hunan University is focusing on research-based design with a focus on human-centered design and design strategy. Also since 2004, Hong Kong Polytechnic University (HKPU) has offered a master's in design (Design Strategies) that integrates design, business and technology.

Shanghai's Tongji University, one of China's top technical schools, tapped experts from schools around the world, including HKPU and IIT, to advise on the launch of the new College of Design & Innovation, which opened in May. The college, which replaces the Art & Design Dept. under the College of Architecture & Urban Planning, hopes to foster innovation in China through design research, design management and education, and will focus on international, interdisciplinary cooperation.

Looking for Respect

Lorraine Justice, head of HKPU's design school and member of the advisory group to Tongji's new college, says the school will offer a research-based program. The university also founded the Tongji-KIC Design Innovation Center in Shanghai to encourage collaboration between industry and academic institutions. "Design education in Tongji is transferring from Bauhaus to D school" and will be more international, inter-disciplinary, and innovative, pledges Lou Yongqi, a professor and deputy head of the new college.

Based on experiences in the developed world, however, the transition might not be quick or easy. Even today in the U.S., "the fact that most design programs are in art schools is problematic," says John Rousseau, design director at brand design firm Hornall Anderson. Because many schools have focused on the craft of design, with little interaction with business, communications, and computer science, he says, design graduates often are ill-prepared to collaborate with other professionals.

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