Pseudo-participation

A term coined by Palacin et al. (2020) to describe forms of user involvement in design that appear participatory on the surface but grant participants limited power to shape outcomes. In accessibility and AI contexts, pseudo-participation occurs when disabled people are invited to contribute as testers, early adopters, data generators, or 'co-designers' within terms and scope pre-set by the company, producing legitimacy for corporate decisions while the authority to refuse, renegotiate, or redirect the project remains with the organisation. It is contrasted with genuine participatory and justice-oriented approaches that redistribute agency to disabled communities.