We proudly present our 47th issue, redesigned by Irma Boom and Julia Neller with more accessibility and generosity towards the reader as well as the content. We’re curious to hear what you think!

It’s not the latest Hollywood production, the ultimate sound experience, or Apple’s next level consumer lock-in product line. And despite its ominous ring, it isn’t the enemy either, like the NSA appears to be. THE SYSTEM* indicates the complex interaction of the economy, professional practice and personal choice. The asterisk draws attention to the ambiguity of such a term, while hinting at an intention to change ‘it’, whatever it is. What the system does, on the other hand, is perhaps more easily understood: it organizes things. The system is a set of institutions and infrastructures that shape the contours of resource flows and modulate the rhythms of material cycles. The system doesn’t just distribute and determine availability though; it frames the imagination and conditions creative activity there within. In this issue of Volume, we’re dilating our pupils to focus on ‘the system’ itself, treating it as a result of, and therefore question of, design. As we are unfortunately well aware, lobbying is not enough to change the system. Applying strategies like leveraging, short-circuiting, disrupting and infecting might be more effective.

Information
Volume #47: THE SYSTEM*
Editor-in-chief: Arjen Oosterman
Designed by Irma Boom and Julia Neller
144 Pages
Soft-cover Binding
ISSN 1574-9401
ISBN 9789077966471

Buy Volume #47

Table of Contents
Editorial: How Much Does Your System Weigh?
Arjen Oosterman

Mining Value
Lionel Devlieger interview

Resist, Release, Retire, Repeat
Debbie Chen

Expanding Dredge Geologics
Neeraj Bhatia / The Open Workshop

Latent City
Yaohua Wang

The Project of a Collective Line
Godofredo Enes Pereira

Neck of the Moon
Design Earth

Cosmic Circuitry
Sasha Engelmann

Cycles of Creativity
Jan Jongert interview

Metabolic Wastebelts for Suburbia
Alan M. Berger et al. and MIT Center for Advanced Urbanism

Logistical Hijack
Clare Lyster

Global Security Pipeline
Nick Axel

Acceleration and Rationalization
Francesco Marullo

Rewiring Territories
The Petropolis of Tomorrow

Polysynthetic Reclamation
Bruno De Meulder and Kelly Shannon

Unknown Unknowns
Rob Holmes

Open Supply Blockchains
Guy James

Deposition Effects
Jesse LeCavalier

Revolution as a Technical Question
Amador Fernández-Savater

Geographies of Uncertainty
Ghazal Jafari

Two Liquids
Tom Fox

Back to the Source
Thomas Rau interview

Coup de Grâce
Patrik Schumacher

Infinite Circulation
Ross Exo Adams

Babel
Edwin Gardner and Christiaan Fruneaux

Sample and Hold
Robert Gerard Pietrusko

Protocols of Interplay
Keller Easterling