Ck, An Engineering Design Theory?

The CK theory developed by Hatchuel, Weil and Le Masson has raised interest and controversies in the academic and practitioners' communities. This paper is participating to this debate. After presenting the scope, focus, and the contributions claimed by its creators; the authors analyse the interest of considering also other concepts and models usually integrated in traditional design knowledge and practices. Indeed, it can be noticed that important concepts such as the concepts of function and structure for example seems to remain outside the perimeter of CK even if some of them are integrated in the research programs of the authors. This is not a central limitation if the real scope of the theory will be minimized, compared with the initial ambition of the CK's creators. It is nevertheless a fruitful contribution which explicitly creates a distinction between knowledge, concepts and notes the importance of expanding partition. The present contribution proposes to enrich the initial scope of CK by integrating theoretical contributions made by other authors and by considering concepts widely used and accepted in engineering design.