The emergence of the European Community raises the question of sharing social and cultural knowledge and resources among the citizens of Europe. There is now a challenge to design AI systems for the distribution and transfer of knowledge and skills that build upon the strengths of the diversity and richness of cultures of Europe. Such an anthropocentric approach will provide an alternative to the current machine-centered approach, and would be equally applicable for the transfer of knowledge and ski lb internationally and not solely within Europe. It is suggested that central to such a transfer is the design of participatory systems that focus on the production, distribution, mediation, and diffusion of knowledge in diverse socio-cultural contexts. In this paper, the SEAKE Centre's projects, especially „Brighton Parosi”, and „Adult Literacy” projects, are discussed to provide an insight into the concepts and practice of designing participatory systems. The philosophy of these projects was rooted in the sharing of social and cultural experiences through participatory learning. Development of the projects involved a process of exchange of language and culture in both formal and informal learning environments. For the Parosi Project social interaction was the central core for the exchange of cultural experiences and the language acquisition process. The Adult Literacy project built on the exchange process and used the idea of the mediation of knowledge for the design of a knowledge-based system. The design process developed by these projects could be described as a participatory design approach that builds upon and extends the human-machine symbiosis and dialogue approaches.
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