Social Emergency Response Centers (SERCs) are an imagined arrangement, a DIY public infrastructure that any community can use when they need it. They are co-created with activists, artists and community members alike. are an imagined arrangement, a DIY public infrastructure that any community can use when they need it. They are co-created with activists, artists and community members alike.

Public Kitchen is a “productive fiction” that invites community residents to experience a not-yet-existing public infrastructure—or arrangement, if you would—that could make their daily lives more vibrant, affordable, tasty and healthy.

“Let’s Flip It” is a communication system developed by and for young people most affected by social violence in Boston. Youth interns at DS4SI’s Youth Activism Design Institute (YADI) identified how logos on sports caps were being used to communicate membership in turf based gangs, crews and cliques. This example of participatory action research and design led to our “Let’s Flip It” campaign, YADI’s longest lasting youth-led campaign against horizontal violence.

“Lighting the Bridge” was an example of intervening in a hard arrangement, in this case a commuter rail bridge underpass on a busy street that was poorly lit and felt unsafe to passers-by. We intervened in this arrangement with a temporary, guerilla-style bridge lighting.