The social agency of infrastructure design

When infrastructure design manifests in local realities, it is bound to work in, with, and sometimes against complex social circumstances. Still, infrastructure may often appear as a neutral technical stratum of urbanism, society, and everyday conduct. The paper argues that this perceived neutrality leaves the social implications, intended and incidental (side-)effects of infrastructure design naturalized and black boxed. The paper interprets the connection between the social and infrastructure design through the fields of urban studies and mobilities studies and links these engagements with the design and architecture fields, outlining the conceptual and analytical potential of these approaches to infrastructure design scholarship and practice. The intention is to propose and invite conversations at the intersection of infrastructure design and adjacent social science fields. In so doing we aim to respond to an urgent need for understanding the social (side) effects of infrastructure so as to contribute to the production of more socially equitable futures.