Call for Contributions – Progetto Grafico Journal #42 – Design under attack: Politics, values and responsibility principles
Dear colleagues, researchers and scholars,
The editorial board of Progetto Grafico is pleased to present the Call for Contributions for issue 42 of the journal,
Over recent decades, visual communication design has been recognized as a cultural and social agent capable of promoting values such as inclusivity, sustainability, justice, participation and democracy. Reflections on activist design have centered on the need to respond to people’s real needs, promoting design oriented towards the common good and social responsibility.
However, in a context marked by authoritarian drift, ecological crises, ideological polarization, populism and disinformation, the values traditionally associated with design are increasingly threatened by political, economic and media forces that aim at collective de-responsibilization and the regression of civil, environmental and social rights.
Thematic areas of interest
Issue 42 of the journal aims to welcome contributions that reflect on some key questions:
- Reaffirming the role of design as a responsible and critical practice: how can visual communication design respond to a reality that subverts its founding values?
- Designing forms of contrast to dominant communication: what communicative, design and speculative strategies can counter the rhetoric of populism, anti-scientificity and post-truth?
- Hybridizing visual languages as an act of civic voice and action: what languages, devices and formats are emerging in visual design as a form of political action?
- Designing communication tools for the visibility of marginalized subjectivities: to what extent can communication design build spaces of resistance, solidarity and representation for marginalized subjectivities?
- Demonstrating the political nature of every design act: does “value-free” design exist or is every project inevitably political?
- Investigating contemporary work systems and design platforms: what are the organizational, institutional and technological conditions that enable or hinder the action of communicative design as a form of social and political intervention?
Types of contribution
Contributions are organized into four sections:
- Research – Ricercare: Scientific essays of 25,000-30,000 characters divided into the categories Experiment (applied research and design innovations), Map (case studies and critical analyses) and Narrate (historical research on relevant phenomena, personalities or artifacts).
- Visualize – Visualizzare: Scientific communication artifacts accompanied by texts of maximum 7,000 characters, including infographics, visual essays, scientific posters and data visualization models.
- Discover – Scoprire: Critical reviews of scientific monographic volumes of maximum 7,000 characters, subject to approval by the editorial committee.
- Wander – Divagare: Scientific essays of 25,000-30,000 characters of high methodological quality that, while not directly falling within the theme of the call, offer innovative contributions to the discipline.
Deadlines calendar
Call opening: September 1, 2025
Deadline for review proposals: September 15, 2025
Deadline for contributions: October 28, 2025
Acceptance notification: November 20, 2025
Final version deadline: December 15, 2025
Publication: January 2026
Submission guidelines
Contributions must be sent to redazione_progettografico@aiap.it following the specifications indicated in the “Instructions for Authors” document, which includes editorial standards, APA Style 7 citation criteria and technical specifications for visual materials.
Authors may provide a maximum of 10 copyright-free images accompanied by complete captions with credits.
The editorial board of Progetto Grafico invites the scientific community to contribute to this critical reflection on visual communication design as a tool for analysis and intervention in contemporary social and political contexts.