Published: October 2026

Keywords:
Maria Esther Cavagnis, clinic of difference, difference, differentiation, aesthetics, colonialism, decolonisation, Gregory Bateson, Gilles Deleuze, assemblage, system, lines of flight, sensation, body, lived experience, systemic approach, subjectivity, singularity, immanence, representation, representational tension, mapping, cartography, openness, signs, Henri-Louis Bergson, empirical data, iatrogenic risk.

Maria Esther Cavagnis

Maria Esther Cavagnis, Specialist in systemic-relational therapy with families and couples. Director of the Families and Couples Foundation.

She is a psychologist and family therapist with extensive experience in clinical practice, education, and research. She studied Psychology at the National University of Córdoba in Argentina and completed postgraduate studies in Clinical Psychology and Educational Research in Colombia. Since 2005, she has served as Director of Studies at the Family and Couples Therapy Foundation (FyP) in Buenos Aires, coordinating training and research programs. Since 1980, she has worked in psychotherapy and family therapy practice.

Inga-Britt Krause

Dr Inga-Britt Krause, PhD, Training and Development Consultant at the Tavistock Clinic; Lecturer in the Ph.D. program in Systemic Psychotherapy.

She is an anthropologist and a systemic psychotherapist.

Introductory Note from the Metalogos Editorial Team

We thank Maria Esther Cavagnis for sending us this text as a supplement to her video, which was screened at the 2026 Metalogos Conference. The video formed the first part of her joint presentation with Inga Britt Krause, entitled “Decolonising Subjectivity, Decolonising the Clinic: A Presentation in Two Parts.”

In the second part, Inga Britt Krause presented an ongoing clinical case and described their shared clinical and research work, which continues. It was decided that this part should not be published in Metalogos. Instead, the two speakers proposed publishing an article by Maria Esther Cavagnis, which we present here.

Abstract

This article explores the concept and possibility of a clinic of difference within psychotherapy, challenging the classical, universalist, and empirical models of contemporary science. Drawing on the philosophical frameworks of Gregory Bateson and Gilles Deleuze, the author argues that clinical practice should move away from predetermined, rigid categories and discrete entities toward an immanent understanding of relationships and ongoing processes of differentiation.