In her blog, Dr. Stefanie Di Russo wrote a wonderful article called “A brief history of Design Thinking: how design came to be”. It’s a great piece that I will refer to several times since it provides a clear account even for the less smart people like me. So, in her article, Stefanie (yes, in this book we will all be on a first name basis) says it like this: “If you want to get nit picky about history, participatory design can be traced all the way back to Plato’s Republic.”

Co-creation, co-design, or participatory design is another key element of the Service Design practice. For those whom the term isn’t clear enough, here is another nice definition from Wikipedia: “Participatory design (originally co-operative design, now often co-design) is an approach to design attempting to actively involve all stakeholders (e.g. employees, partners, customers, citizens, end users) in the design process to help ensure the result meets their needs and is usable.”

Service Design, as we saw in the definition, is definitely an approach that tries to bring all stakeholders together — not only the end users but also all the people involved in the creation of a service.

Now we go back to our beloved Greeks. In an article on the Trig innovation consultancy blog, the authors explain the link between co-creation (or participatory design) and Plato’s Republic in the following terms: “You can trace the history of Participatory Design all the way back to Plato’s Republic, as Plato was known to seek advice from his people.

Grass roots democracy can be seen as coming from a participatory methodology as it established a style of collaboration that has been used for centuries to help develop harmonious societies.”

Sure, co-creation can be seen as a subtype or a very specific type of democratic process where those who are affected by a service or product have their say about what they want.

You can now feel prouder than ever! If you are a Service Design practitioner like me, you can always say that your practice dates back to 10,000 BC. But if you want to look even fancier, just drop the names of Hippocrates (500 BC) or Plato (380 BC). My next dinner party will make me look fancy and smart.

This article is part of the book "A Tiny History of Service Design, " a tiny two-hour read that goes through the historical events that created what Service Design is today.