Aarhus 2025 conference

The sixth decennial Aarhus conference aims to continue to set new agendas for critical action, theory, and practice in computing. With the title, Computing (X) Crisis, we invite contributions that present and discuss the different roles of computing in shaping, understanding, improving, causing and acting on the human condition in a world subsumed by multiple crises. ‍ The 1975, 1985 and 1995 Aarhus conferences focussed on computing in working life in the context of democracy. While both the 2005 and 2015 conferences acknowledged that computing influences most parts of human life (civic life, the welfare state, health, learning, leisure, culture, intimacy, …), the 2015 conference explicitly called for critical perspectives and alternatives in alignment with utopian principles—that is, the hope that things might not only be different but also radically better. ‍ Today, ‘crisis’ characterises seemingly perilous moments linked to the climate, economic and social inequality, democracy, relations among societies and, more broadly, a flourishing life for all critters, human and otherwise. And at the same time computing seems omnipresent, providing glimmers of hope but at the same time acting as a source of the troubles.