Systems are everywhere: as concepts, practices, and lifeways, they have sparked extensive theoretical debates and permeated creative work across multiple fields. Originating in the field of biology, systems theory was a mode of thought that incorporated many important mid-20th-century methods (cybernetics, information theory, scientific management) and evolved into social sciences and governance theories. For instance, sociologist Niklas Luhmann redefined autopoietic systems by extending the concept beyond biology to self-reproducing social mechanisms. The conceptual framework of the system has also permeated contemporary thought. Though not always named as such, Gilles Deleuze, for example, argues that Foucauldian disciplinary societies are giving way to control societies, governed by flexible, dynamic, and continuously modulating systems. In our contemporary moment, the persistence of systemic crises such as climate change, political extremism, and military conflicts may also be read as symptomatic of a broader failure of systems. In Asia, systems theory—despite its Western roots—intersects with local particularities, such as the influence of systems thinking on China’s One-Child Policy, the establishment of biometric systems in India, and Singapore’s Smart Nation initiative. The region’s rapid, uneven development also presents unique challenges and opportunities to rethink systems theory beyond Western paradigms. As Kuan-Hsing Chen argues in Asia as Method, shifting analytical attention to intra-Asian cultural and historical exchanges could allow for a more situated understanding of systemic thought.

This seminar explores how systems theories, practices, and aesthetics have been transmitted, transformed, and contested across Asia. We invite diverse interpretations of “system” and welcome comparative approaches that connect Asia with other regions, such as Eastern Europe and Latin America. Papers may engage with literary, cinematic, linguistic, sociological, philosophical, technological, religious, and other cultural or historical perspectives on the following themes (among others):

• How do Asian contexts—such as post-WWII infrastructure projects—produce alternatives to Eurocentric systems theory from premodern to contemporary times?
• In what ways are systems operationalized in Asia, particularly through digital technologies? For example, how do social media platforms and AI algorithms construct “data identities”?
• How do artistic and cultural works represent, critique, or reimagine systems thinking? For instance, to what extent do science fiction thought experiments expose or reconfigure systemic logics?
• How do system-oriented practices shape affective engagement in society, culture, and technology? For example, how does sound act as a systemic interface that governs affect?
• What new insights emerge when we reconceptualize “systems” as culturally and historically shaped imaginaries of knowledge, power, and interconnection?