User-Centered Design incompleteness

I got my Design Council newsletter today. It has a quite old user-centered design article (2007) that made me recall some questions I have about the diverse design ideas and methods today. The article makes interesting comments about how design is still focused on companies rather than users. Most of the claims were not new like the Norman principles but anyway highly worth. The article suggests that one should be cautious about the issues you ask users. It uses the meaning quote from Henry Ford: “If I’d asked people what they wanted, they’d have said faster horses.” I find this quote is very inspiring. Also, the article recommends that the designer must look at how users actually behave, not what they say they do. I agree that user-center design approach is the way for efficient objects whatever they are, but is efficiency the only need?

It seems that design practitioners that are applying user-centered design are refining the way they understand users. This is very good for design and for users. However, I just wonder if this method alone is enough for society’s needs. I believe that although user-centered design is necessary, it is an incomplete method that should be connected to an integral idea of design. Think for example in sustainability, can design be green and user-centered at the same time? I’d say that it should be. It happens too with other “new designs” like social design, universal design and so on. Design practice should be integral, not only efficient, not only green, not only inclusive, but all of them.