Future home of Kymmenykset.org....
Nearly fiften years ago I discovered a Finnish word dating back to medieval times. A word so obscure that some Finns have never even heard it. This word, kymmenykset, means the same thing as the medieval church word tithe. A thithe was something one paid: a peasant would set aside ten percent of his crop for the poor, a rich man would give up ten percent of his income at the end of the year to feed those in need. Being designers, we don't have to pay money in the form of kymmenykset or a tithe. Being designers, we can pay by giving ten percent of our crop of ideas and talents to the seventy-five percent of mankind in need. Since then I have been delighted as year after year designers from many countries accepted and practiced this social self tithing.
There will always be people who spend all of their time designing for the needs of mankind. Most of the rest of us can't do that well, but I think even the most successful designer can afford to give one-tenth of his time. It is unimportant what the mechanics of the situation are: four hours out of every forty, one working day out of every ten, or ideally, every tenth year spent as a sort of sabbatical, designing for many instead of designing for money.
In the 1970s, Björn Wecktröm, Finland's most famous designer of jewelry, left his international practice for one year to give his time to design survival shelters in East Africa, inspired by this tithing idea. Even if the corporate greed of many design offices make this kind of design impossible, students at least should be encouraged to work in this manner. For in showing students new areas of engagement, we may set up alternative patterns of thinking about design problems. We may help them to develop the kind of social and moral responsibility that is needed.
- Victor Papanek, from his book Design for the Real World
Related ideas in action:
Volunteers in Technical Assistance
Buckminster Fuller Institute Volunteer Info
A Public Domain Progressive Automotive Design
The Kymmenykset.org is a project of Fourth World