The broader responsibility of HCI research

Lately my mind has been occupied with the question of the purpose and responsibility of HCI research. Why do we reserch, for whom do we do it, what do we expect to ackomplish, and is it important? These are not new questions for me, I have dealt with them all through my career. And I am of course not the only one challenged by these issues. Today, I decided to write something about this topic on my blog and then realized that I have, together with my colleague Anna Croon Fors, already written about this in an article called "Critical HCI Research – A Research Position Proposal" (link to a pdf version). I think we make a quite good case in the first parts of the paper where we discuss the "big" question and its ramifications. In the second part of the paper we try to fomulate a position that would lead to research that we see important. I think the first part can (and should) be read by anyone doing HCI research (!), while the second part might be more difficult and challenging. I am quite happy to link to this paper since I find the first part to be crucial and highly important to our field.