Volume 2, No. 1Creative Perspectives on Society, Management, and Urban Change

This research article examines an art-based research creation developed within the OASis Europe project during the Shadow Architecture residency, which reimagines transcultural cemetery architecture through Indonesian Indigenous practices and contemporary technology. The project challenges Western paradigms of concealment by reframing cemeteries as neglected urban spaces and sites of relational memory. The work consists of two speculative outputs: Native Signals from a Resting Ground, a physical installation inspired by Trunyan open-air burial traditions that integrates live Indonesian seismic data as a generative soundscape, and A Cemetery of Possibilities, a custom GPT-based interface that invites participants to imagine their own memorial forms. Through these works, the project investigates how art, science, and technology can operate as media of memory and co-authorship, enabling individuals to articulate personal narratives and transcultural identities within the site of the cemetery. By integrating Indigenous cultural practices, geoscience, and computational creativity, the research proposes an experimental speculative necro-aesthetic art grounded in reciprocity between human and more-than-human worlds.

Purpose:
To diagnose whether the volatility of the global horizontal B2B SaaS platform field (2020–2026) reflects saturation regimes or structural retention, using RTDAS v1.1 and the S-Screen operator.

Background:
The global market for horizontal B2B SaaS platforms (CRM, ERP, ITSM, HR, collaboration tools) experienced significant turbulence between 2020 and 2026, characterized by pandemic-driven growth, a sharp correction in 2022–2023, and the rapid integration of artificial intelligence. Academic and industry discourse often misinterprets this volatility as a sign of structural instability or market saturation, leading to ambiguous diagnoses. This article addresses this gap by applying the Relational Theory of the Development of Active Systems (RTDAS) v1.1, incorporating the S-Screen operator, to empirical data. Based on 31 open signals across two time slices (2020–2022 and 2023–2026), it demonstrates that the SaaS field is organized as an Unsustainable Problematic Configuration (UPC). This constitutes a self-reproducing structure where key actors (vendors, integrators, clients) derive distributed benefits from persistent complexity, high Total Cost of Ownership (TCO), and the mutation of innovations (AI, new pricing models) into additional lock-in mechanisms.

Materials and Methods:
Field-level case study using 31 open signals across two time slices (2020–2022; 2023–2026), processed through the RTDAS v1.1 diagnostic sequence with the S-Screen operator, R* formulation, and a stress test with falsification conditions.

Results:
The S-Screen operator systematically excludes the dominance of resource, procedural, and legitimation saturation, identifying the complexity dimension as an internal mechanism of the UPC rather than an external limit. The article formulates the configuration's minimal core (R*), conducts a stress test, and proposes early indicators and conditions for falsification. This work contributes to the Theory of Saturation (Manafi, 2025) and the Saturation–Collapse (SEA) model by offering an operational diagnostic tool that positions saturation as one regime among others within the development of an active system. A reproducible protocol for regime diagnosis is presented, applicable to other complex systems.

Conclusion:
The diagnosis supports structural retention (UPC) rather than a dominant saturation regime, and provides a reproducible protocol for regime diagnosis applicable to other complex systems.

Urban morphology provides a critical framework for understanding the spatial structure of cities and the processes through which urban form evolves over time. While traditional morphological schools have examined the persistence of town plans, the transformation of building types, and the configurational logic of spatial networks, fewer studies have interpreted these processes through a systemic model of urban thresholds and structural limits. Manafi’s theory of saturation and the associated Collapse (SEA) model (Manafi, 2025, 2026) introduce such a perspective by conceptualizing urban systems as dynamic entities that move through phases of consolidation, saturation, and reorganization. Beyond a descriptive framework, the SEA model also functions as an analytical and predictive tool, proposing that collapse occur when the balance between stability, efficiency, and adaptability is disrupted. Because these three dimensions operate across multiple scales, the model has potential applications in diverse fields, including urban planning, infrastructure systems, environmental studies, and socio-spatial analysis.

This research investigates how the SEA model can be used as both a meta-framework and an interpretative tool for re-examining the principal schools of urban morphology. It aims to explore how the model helps identify moments at which urban structures reach their functional or spatial limits, and how it explains the mechanisms through which urban systems reorganize after these thresholds are reached. By applying the SEA perspective to established morphological traditions, the study seeks to demonstrate how saturation and collapse can be understood not only as crises but also as drivers of spatial transformation. Through this linkage between morphological theory and systemic urban dynamics, the research contributes to a more integrative understanding of urban change and highlights the relevance of SEA-informed analysis for contemporary planning and urban design practice.

As deindustrialization and rapid urban transformation have left many industrial sites underutilized across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), this paper examines the adaptive reuse of abandoned structures as a culture-led strategy for urban regeneration. While culture-led regeneration, creative city and post-creative city paradigms have been widely studied in Western contexts, their application within the MENA region remains less explored. This study therefore asks: to what extent do adaptive reuse projects of former industrial spaces in the MENA region align with or diverge from post-creative urban regeneration principles? Through a qualitative and comparative case study approach, the research analyzes four prominent examples of culture-led industrial reuse in the MENA region: the JAX District in Riyadh, Alserkal Avenue in Dubai, the Electricity Hangar Gallery in Amman, and Les Anciens Abattoirs in Casablanca. An analytical framework derived from literature and theory consists of four dimensions that will guide the evaluation of each case: governance and development approach, cultural production versus cultural consumption, inclusion and reuse. The findings suggest that industrial adaptive reuse in the MENA region operates along a spectrum between creative and post-creative urban models, with a tendency for cases in Gulf cities remaining closely aligned with creative city paradigms, driven by state or private investment. In contrast, the Electricity Hangar in Amman and Casablanca slaughterhouses demonstrate stronger affinities with post-creative principles. The paper argues that future regeneration of industrial heritage in the MENA region may benefit from hybrid models of creative urbanism and calls for a more context-sensitive redefinition of post-creative urbanism.