1. The Crisis of Unassessed Autistic People

Contrary to the old myth, a third of people do not get better on the waiting list! Autistic people are stressed and let down by the long waiting lists for neurodiversity assessments. Private assessments cost four figure sums.

• How can the systemic therapy community offer interventions?
• What can systemic therapists do about long waiting lists? What is being done? Do we do the ADOS training? Do we set up an alternative assessment movement, inside and outside the NHS?
• What else can we do to change society so the world is more neurodiverse attuned?
• What expectations do people have of assessments?
• NHS or Private: what are the issues?
• How do systemic therapists challenge dismissive narratives which justify poor resourcing?
• How do we make a new sense of the systemic crisis in not meeting neurodiversity need?
• How are we allies in challenging compulsory autism assessments for non-binary and trans young people asking for gender identity services?

2. The Role of Systemic Professionals in Improving Autistic People’s Lives

Given systemic therapy’s specialism in communication and understanding the impact of context on people’s sense of themselves and what people can achieve, you’d think we would play an important role in improving the lives of autistic people and their families.

• What is or could be the role of systemic therapists with autistic people and in neurodiversity teams?
• Have we allowed psychologists and psychiatrists to see autism and therefore autistic people as their domain, within a medical model?
• What is our role in a neurodiverse society?
• What theories do systemic therapists need to work with autistic people - when autistic people can be so different from each other?
• Which systemic ideas about context and identity could be useful?
• How should and could autistic people influence training programmes and service design?
• And what are we going to do to be proactively of use to autistic people and their families?

Submissions

• Papers (4000-7000 words). These will be peer reviewed, fully referenced and observe the guidance for contributors to MJTSP: https://murmurations.cloud/ojs/index.php/murmurations/guidelines
• Papers which address systemic theory and practice in-depth in relation to this topic.
• Papers which are theoretical, philosophical, arts oriented from outside the systemic field but with relational implications and therefore potential usefulness.
• Poems – in any form
• Short stories of about 1000 words
• Practice or research notes up to 2000 words
• Photo or video essays
• Audio recordings or videos

MAKE A SUBMISSION at https://murmurations.cloud

Murmurations is a systemic practice journal. You need to show relationality, reveal who you are (in your many selves and how they are present and in play out in the writing), ensure you have genuine permission to include the lives of others in your writing or media, and hold in mind the key ethic of “Nothing about us without us!”

Please read some of the papers in this journal to understand the unique contribution of this systemic practice journal.

TIMEFRAME

Submission date 15^th January 2026 (earlier submissions welcome). Publication in Summer 2026.

Guest Editors: Monica Whyte, David Steare, Gail Simon.  If you have an idea about something you’re considering submitting, we’d like to hear from you. Email any questions to editors@murmurations.cloud

Website: murmurations.cloud and check the website for dates of sessions with the guest editors to discuss your ideas for a submission.