Last week I attended the World Economic Forum’s second Summit on the Global Agenda in Dubai. There were over 700 experts and thought leaders from business, academia, civil society and government putting forward their ideas. I am a member of the Council on Design. And like last year it was beyond inspiring to see the growing influence of design thinking in these unfolding debates.

The wide ranging proposals from the members of the 76 Global Agenda Councils covered the most pressing issues facing the world today. These ideas will be explored further at the Forum’s Annual Meeting in Davos in January.

This ideation / brainstorming summit is the backbone of the Forum’s Global Redesign Initiative launched at this year’s Annual Meeting in Davos. Its aim is to explore new and better ways to better support systems of international cooperation. And, frankly, for participants to build new relationships with leaders from around the world.

The members of our Council who came to Dubai included Paola Antonelli, Tim Brown (Chairman), Craig Branigan, Kigge Hvid, Chris Luebkeman, John Maeda, Mokena Makeka, Toshiko Mori (Vice-Chair), Kohei Nishiyama, Alice Rawsthorn, Sudhir Sharma and Jens Martin Skibsted with leadership from Emma Loades at the World Economic Forum.

These are the design principles and three proposals our Council presented on the final day of the Summit:

The Global Agenda Council on Design

Design is an agent of change that enables us to understand complex changes and problems, and to turn them into something useful. By bringing together designers and design thinkers, the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on Design serves as a unique source of interdisciplinary expertise for the wider network of Councils.

The Global Agenda Council on Design is committed to applying design thinking to analyzing systemic problems, and to inventing and delivering creative solutions. We have identified six design principles, which should help us – and our fellow Global Agenda Councils – to develop new ideas and strategies to address the problems facing us all.

• Clarity: Complex problems require simple, clear and honest solutions.

• Inspiration: Successful solutions will move people by satisfying their needs, giving meaning to their lives, and raising their hopes and expectations.

• Transformation: Exceptional problems demand exceptional solutions that may be radical and even disruptive.

• Participation: Effective solutions will be collaborative, inclusive and developed with the people who will use them.

• Context: No solution should be developed or delivered in isolation but should recognize its context in terms of time, place and culture.

• Sustainability: Every solution needs to be robust, responsible and designed with regard to its long-term impact on the environment and society.

Based on our discussions with fellow councils we have developed three proposals for projects intended to fulfil the World Economic Forum’s mission of improving the state of the world:

Universal symbols to encourage sustainable consumption – Many consumers wish to behave more responsibly but are unsure as to how to do so. We propose to develop an internationally-recognized set of symbols – one to indicate the water footprint of a product and its packaging; the other to indicate their combined carbon footprint. This simple system will also encourage more consumers to follow suit in future and companies to behave more responsibly.

Design thinking within education – As design thinking is an invaluable tool to help us to think and act creatively, we propose to introduce it as a core subject on the K-12 curriculum all over the world. By providing students with a methodology for understanding global challenges and giving them the means with which to conceive and develop solutions, this would be a simple but effective way of nurturing a new generation of instinctive lateral thinkers and problem solvers.

Lifecycle-adjusted value system – This looks at the cost of existence including utilization and decomissioning costs. By visualizing and revealing these costs to society, this offers a new way of measuring value. It strives to convert a debt-focused society into an asset-focused society by changing the valuation system. It is a paradigm shift so that one generation creates assets for the next generation instead of debts.

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The Summit Co-Chair Mohamed Alabbar, of the United Arab Emirates, in the closing plenary said: “This is really the blueprint of the future direction of the global well-being.”

Despite the recent economic news from Dubai, I hope he’s right.