Mediatization as a Framework for Social Design: For a Better Life with Media

Abstract

Through the appropriation of new media people can extend their capabilities as autonomous human beings. At the same time, however, mediatization means that new forms of social and technological dependence emerge, accompanied by experiences of frustration, stress, and anxiety. Such experiences can be identified above all within the realm of mediatized work/life – an increasingly blurred social terrain where the prospects of media-enhanced, flexible working conditions easily evolve into further socio-technological entanglements with media. Against this background, this article assesses the prospects of employing mediatization theory as a framework for developing better-informed social design practices. It argues that social design should have as its goal to enhance the capacity among social agents to maintain a sense of autonomy in relation to mediatization. Following a cultural materialist view of mediatization, the article introduces a two-dimensional matrix for systematizing (in terms of objects and objectives) how social design may address the social consequences of mediatization. The practical implications of the suggested framework are discussed in relation to empirical examples taken from the realm of flexible work.