A Warning from the Future: Antisemitism as Systemic Misrecognition in Complex Societies

By Charles D. Sage

Abstract

Antisemitism has recurred across radically different historical epochs, political ideologies, and sociocultural systems. This enduring pattern calls for an explanatory framework beyond moral condemnation or conventional sociological analysis. This paper advances a systems-theoretic hypothesis: that antisemitism reflects a recurrent failure in the interpretive processes of complex societies, in which a functionally integrative subsystem—often embodied in Jewish communal roles—is misrecognized as a threat under conditions of acute stress. Drawing on analogies from evolutionary biology, cybernetics, and sociological systems theory, the paper posits that antisemitism constitutes a form of collective autoimmune response, one triggered by breakdowns in symbolic coherence and functional differentiation. This reconceptualization has implications for both the historical understanding of antisemitism and the prevention of future episodes of societal regression.

1. Introduction

Antisemitism is among the most durable and puzzling pathologies in human history. Unlike other forms of prejudice that emerge in relatively specific cultural or political contexts, antisemitism has manifested across disparate systems: feudal Europe, revolutionary France, czarist and Soviet Russia, Nazi Germany, postwar Arab nationalism, and twenty-first century populism. The persistence of this phenomenon, even in environments with no direct historical, religious, or economic continuity, suggests that something more fundamental is at play.

This paper proposes a systems-theoretic reframing of antisemitism: not merely as a prejudice or ideology, but as a recurrent failure in the self-regulatory and interpretive processes of complex societies. Specifically, it argues that the Jewish communal role—as it has evolved over millennia—has often functioned as a symbolic-regulatory subsystem within the broader social organism. Under conditions of systemic stress, that role becomes misrecognized, triggering an autoimmune-like reaction in which the society attacks what it falsely perceives as alien, parasitic, or subversive.

2. Historical Pattern and the Limits of Conventional Explanations

The standard frameworks for understanding antisemitism—psychological, sociological, and moral—have offered important insights. Projection theory explains scapegoating as a defense mechanism. Marxist analysis connects Jewish persecution to class conflict and the dislocations of capitalism. Religious interpretations cite longstanding theological disputes. Each of these models describes aspects of the phenomenon but fails to account for its recurrence across incompatible systems.

Moreover, antisemitism often flares up precisely at moments when Jewish communities appear integrated or even flourishing. The paradox of perceived “outsider” status amid institutional inclusion challenges binary narratives of oppression and power. A more dynamic and structurally sensitive explanation is required—one that accounts for the emergent properties of social systems under duress.

3. Functional Differentiation and the Role of Symbolic-Regulatory Subsystems

Modern societies, following the insights of Niklas Luhmann and Talcott Parsons, are characterized by functional differentiation. This means that subsystems emerge to specialize in particular tasks—economy, law, science, religion, education—each with its own logic, autonomy, and symbolic code. Jewish communal life, shaped by diasporic continuity and historical marginalization, has repeatedly assumed roles in several of these domains, often disproportionately: commerce and finance (economic subsystem), legal scholarship and rabbinic jurisprudence (normative subsystem), intellectual and academic labor (knowledge subsystem), and media and ritual (symbolic communication subsystem).

Such roles, while often socially productive, can also render a group hypervisible and symbolically loaded. When a society experiences structural incoherence—due to war, economic collapse, technological disruption, or moral fragmentation—symbolically dense subsystems become prime candidates for misrecognition.

4. Misrecognition and the Autoimmune Analogy

From a cybernetic standpoint, complex systems require accurate feedback and recognition to maintain homeostasis. When feedback loops are distorted, the system may fail to distinguish between internal differentiation and external threat. In this framework, antisemitism emerges not as a rational identification of an external enemy, but as a category error—a failure to recognize that what is perceived as “other” is in fact a structurally integrated component of the system.

The biological analogy is instructive. In autoimmune disorders, the immune system identifies self-tissue as hostile and launches a destructive response. Similarly, when symbolic-regulatory subsystems like those historically inhabited by Jews become misrecognized as “foreign” or conspiratorial, the social body mounts an attack—pogrom, expulsion, extermination—on a part of itself.

5. Predictable Conditions and Systemic Triggers

If antisemitism is indeed a systemic misrecognition, then its emergence should correlate with specific structural stressors:

- Loss of symbolic coherence
- Economic dislocation
- Political delegitimization
- Cognitive overload

Each of these conditions impairs the system’s ability to correctly identify and value its own subsystems—making symbolic-regulatory actors especially vulnerable to misrecognition.

6. Implications for Prevention and Policy

If antisemitism is not merely a social prejudice but a systemic failure, then moral condemnation alone will not suffice to prevent its recurrence. What is needed is a form of structural immunization—an enhancement of society’s capacity to accurately interpret its own complexity.

Such immunization may involve:

- Structural literacy
- Narrative integration
- Institutional buffering
- Pluralist resilience

This approach shifts the emphasis from blame to design—from reactive condemnation to proactive integration.

7. Conclusion: Toward a Systems-Conscious Society

Antisemitism, when viewed through a systems-theoretic lens, appears not as a historical accident or irrational hatred, but as a tragic regularity of systemic dysfunction. Recognizing this pattern does not diminish its moral horror; rather, it provides a framework for understanding and anticipating it. In an era of mounting complexity, ecological volatility, and institutional stress, the conditions that have historically triggered antisemitic misrecognition are once again present.

To avoid repeating the past, societies must learn to see themselves more clearly—to cultivate the interpretive capacity to distinguish between pathology and function, between noise and signal. In this effort, systems theory may offer not only explanation, but guidance. The future will not be kind to societies that continue to misread their own structure.

 

References

Douglas, Mary. Purity and Danger. Routledge, 1966.

Luhmann, Niklas. Social Systems. Stanford University Press, 1995.

Parsons, Talcott. The Social System. Free Press, 1951.

Simmel, Georg. 'The Stranger' in The Sociology of Georg Simmel, ed. Kurt H. Wolff.

Bauman, Zygmunt. Modernity and the Holocaust. Cornell University Press, 1989.

Girard, René. Violence and the Sacred. Johns Hopkins University Press, 1977.