Call for Papers: Cubic Issue #12 - Exploring the Complexity of Products, Services, and Systems
Ecosystems of Service Design
Issue Editors: Jaehyun Park, Angus Donald Campbell, Brian Lee, and Marc Chataigner (The Hong Kong Polytechnic University)
We invite contributions on the sociotechnical phenomena of service design ecosystems across products, services, and systems that elucidate the interactions and contradictions between human behaviours, organisational dynamics, and technical determinacy.
Design traditionally focused on images (2D) and objects (3D), however, Redström (2006) argued that it should be understood as a performative process that encompasses the dynamic realms of interactions, experiences, and services. This paradigm shift prompted both researchers and practitioners to reconsider the foundations of design knowledge and practice in order to address this expanded scope. Brigit Mager defines Service Design as the choreography of “processes, technologies, and interactions within complex systems in order to co-create value for relevant stakeholders” (2012, in Service Design Network 2026). However, designers encountered significant challenges in developing robust theoretical frameworks and practical methodologies that can adequately capture the complexity and richness of contemporary service design (Sangiorgi 2011).
Three principal challenges have emerged. First, there is a lack of comprehensive theories, methodologies, and practical approaches that effectively bridge value propositions across products and services from a systems perspective (Vargo, 2012; Secomandi and Snelders 2011; Patrício et al. 2011). Second, existing service design research tends to be theoretically grounded in service-dominant (S-D) logic from marketing and organisational studies (Lusch and Vargo 2014a, 2014b). This is a predominantly resource-based perspective, for example, using methods such as co-creation, stakeholder mapping or service blueprinting, and consequently, falls short of providing a robust theoretical foundation for the concept of service ecosystems - the ultimate goal of service design. Third, as service design moves towards service ecosystems (Mager et al. 2020), service design research and development processes and outcomes need to be reconfigured to accommodate constant change, for example, emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence, robotics, and Internet of Things; addressing latent sociocultural behaviours; and rapidly transforming organisational dynamics in industry and business markets (Ostrom et al. 2015; Vink et al. 2021).
Important dates:
- Call for contributions: 15 April 2026
- Submission deadline: 1 September 2026 (noon, Hong Kong Time)
- Peer review notification: 1 November 2026
- Final publication: 15 April 2027
