Relational Mapping Tool (Beta)

This is an early-stage digital tool prototype developed at the MIT Media Lab as part of Civic Biotechnology: A Field Guide to Place-Based Deployment.

The Relational Mapping Tool is designed to make social, cultural, and institutional dynamics—often implicit in biotechnology deployment—legible and usable. It supports clearer reasoning about feasibility, coordination, and relationship building in place-based contexts.

The tool demonstrates the core logic of a Relational Design Language (RDL): a visual system for translating qualitative interview data into structured maps of stakeholders, governance, and decision-making relationships. Developed through preliminary work with coral conservation partners in Micronesia, Moʻorea, and Jamaica, this beta reflects the first phase of development and is intended as a demonstration rather than a finished product.

This demo showcases our prototype mapping tool, built with the Relational Design Language (RDL). The tool visualizes the networks of relationships—between people, organizations, and resources—that shape conservation work. By making these dynamics visible, it helps practitioners see beyond ecological data alone, exploring how trust, power, and collaboration circulate across a community.

The demo walks you through both the mapping language and the tool’s core functions. You’ll see how interview data is transformed into interactive maps, how relationships are represented through nodes and edges, and how different views can reveal new insights. The goal is to show how complex social dynamics can be made legible—and actionable—for strategy, alignment, and decision-making in conservation contexts.

Read more about Relational Design Language↗