Designing for Mutual Aid

In times of crisis, from natural disasters to the COVID-19 pandemic, people find ways to self-organise to address collective survival needs (mutual aid). While mutual aid is traditionally rooted in offline contexts, the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic saw the rise of mutual aid online, with digital tools and online communities becoming tools for organizing community care. Nonetheless, research in HCI on mutual aid is limited, and understanding how we might design for the principles, values, and work of mutual aid remains an area for future research. Such work is especially important given the importance of mutual aid networks in supporting marginalised communities in satisfying their survival needs. This project explores how we might design for mutual aid, with a focus on marginalised identities.