Paper long abstract:

This paper provides insights into the limits of inclusivity in innovation using rapid participatory approaches.

Our research used a methodology called PROTEE to explore objects and relationships in two rapid participatory technology development projects with vulnerable communities. The projects were part of an overarching project to support citizen-led societal innovation through the development of technology-mediated solutions to social needs.

We identify two key features of such projects that risk perpetuating inequalities through dominant narratives of prototype as endgame. These are:

a) a focus on material prototypes as discrete entities and indexes of project success and

b) an un-problematized perception of user participation which can further perpetuate the project's implicit and uncontested narrative of inclusion/exclusion .

Both projects were successful in terms of rapidly producing prototypes that were adopted by communities, secured follow-on funding and potential commercial interest.

However, as social scientists working with these projects we were acutely aware that the dominant representations of these projects and their prototypes created some collectivities whilst simultaneously disenfranchising others. Using data from our PROTEE dialogues, we articulate how the 'overspills' and 'excesses', the misbehaviours and relationships that are typically left out of the narrative of 'prototype as endgame' are vital to attend to (Michael, 2012).

We argue that the details, subtleties, complex negotiations and experiences of relationships and possible 'discarded' prototypes offer subtle clues as to how to critically reconfigure narratives of inclusive(/exclusive) innovations and to imagine alternative worlds which take full and sensitive account of expanded ontological possibilities.