Artifacts of Abundance

Why design thinking is key to innovations in science, technology, and social progress.

At a time of deep uncertainty, Artifacts of Abundance makes a bold argument for optimism in higher education. Michael M. Crow, Nicole K. Mayberry, and Derrick M. Anderson show how universities and other knowledge-intensive organizations can help societies confront their most difficult challenges. Rather than treating universities as static institutions, they present them as adaptable, design-driven systems that connect science, technology, policy, and public purpose.

The authors ask readers to reconsider: how is progress really made? From the organization of knowledge to the design of research institutions, they examine how human-created systems carry assumptions about what matters and who benefits. The book challenges reductionist approaches to science and policy while making the case for a more integrated, interdisciplinary, and outcome-focused model. Universities, they argue, have the potential to be engines of abundance, creating new possibilities through research, education, and institutional design.

Wide-ranging and forward-looking, Artifacts of Abundance combines history, science and technology policy, higher education, and personal reflection to offer a hopeful vision of social progress. For readers interested in universities, innovation, public policy, and the future of society, this book reframes higher education as one of humanity's most important tools for building a more inclusive and sustainable future.