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Currie TE, Borgerhoff Mulder M, Fogarty L, Schlüter M, Folke C, Haider LJ, Caniglia G, Tavoni A, Jansen REV, Jørgensen PS, Waring TM. Integrating evolutionary theory and social-ecological systems research to address the sustainability challenges of the Anthropocene. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 2024; 379:20220262. [PMID: 37952618 PMCID: PMC10645068 DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2022.0262] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/08/2022] [Accepted: 06/19/2023] [Indexed: 11/14/2023] Open
Abstract
The rapid, human-induced changes in the Earth system during the Anthropocene present humanity with critical sustainability challenges. Social-ecological systems (SES) research provides multiple approaches for understanding the complex interactions between humans, social systems, and environments and how we might direct them towards healthier and more resilient futures. However, general theories of SES change have yet to be fully developed. Formal evolutionary theory has been applied as a dynamic theory of change of complex phenomena in biology and the social sciences, but rarely in SES research. In this paper, we explore the connections between both fields, hoping to foster collaboration. After sketching out the distinct intellectual traditions of SES research and evolutionary theory, we map some of their terminological and theoretical connections. We then provide examples of how evolutionary theory might be incorporated into SES research through the use of systems mapping to identify evolutionary processes in SES, the application of concepts from evolutionary developmental biology to understand the connections between systems changes and evolutionary changes, and how evolutionary thinking may help design interventions for beneficial change. Integrating evolutionary theory and SES research can lead to a better understanding of SES changes and positive interventions for a more sustainable Anthropocene. This article is part of the theme issue 'Evolution and sustainability: gathering the strands for an Anthropocene synthesis'.
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Affiliation(s)
- Thomas E. Currie
- Human Behaviour and Cultural Evolution Group, Centre for Ecology and Conservation, University of Exeter, Penryn Campus, Penryn TR10 9FE, UK
| | - Monique Borgerhoff Mulder
- Department of Anthropology, University of California Davis, Davis, CA 95616, USA
- Santa Fe Institute, Santa Fe, NM 87506, USA
- Max-Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, 04103 Leipzig, Germany
| | - Laurel Fogarty
- Max-Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, 04103 Leipzig, Germany
| | - Maja Schlüter
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, SE-106 91 Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Carl Folke
- Beijer Institute of Ecological Economics, The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, SE-104 05 Stockholm, Sweden
| | - L. Jamila Haider
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, SE-106 91 Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Guido Caniglia
- Konrad Lorenz Institute for Evolution and Cognition Research, A-3400 Klosterneuburg, Austria
| | - Alessandro Tavoni
- Department of Economics, University of Bologna, 40126 Bologna, Italy
- Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, London School of Economics, London WC2A 2AE, UK
| | - Raf E. V. Jansen
- Global Economic Dynamics and the Biosphere, Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, SE-104 05 Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Peter Søgaard Jørgensen
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, SE-106 91 Stockholm, Sweden
- Global Economic Dynamics and the Biosphere, Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, SE-104 05 Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Timothy M. Waring
- Mitchell Center for Sustainability Solutions and School of Economics, University of Maine, Orono, ME 04469-5710, USA
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Lazurko A, Haider LJ, Hertz T, West S, McCarthy DDP. Operationalizing ambiguity in sustainability science: embracing the elephant in the room. Sustain Sci 2023; 19:595-614. [PMID: 38404522 PMCID: PMC10891248 DOI: 10.1007/s11625-023-01446-6] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/07/2023] [Accepted: 12/03/2023] [Indexed: 02/27/2024]
Abstract
Ambiguity is often recognized as an intrinsic aspect of addressing complex sustainability challenges. Nevertheless, in the practice of transdisciplinary sustainability research, ambiguity is often an 'elephant in the room' to be either side-stepped or reduced rather than explicitly mobilized in pursuit of solutions. These responses threaten the salience and legitimacy of sustainability science by masking the pluralism of real-world sustainability challenges and how research renders certain frames visible and invisible. Critical systems thinking (CST) emerged from the efforts of operational researchers to address theoretical and practical aspects of ambiguity. By adapting key concepts, frameworks, and lessons from CST literature and case studies, this paper aims to establish (1) an expansive conceptualization of ambiguity and (2) recommendations for operationalizing ambiguity as a valuable means of addressing sustainability challenges. We conceptualize ambiguity as an emergent feature of the simultaneous and interacting boundary processes associated with being, knowing, and intervening in complex systems, and propose Reflexive Boundary Critique (RBC) as a novel framework to help navigate these boundary processes. Our characterization of ambiguity acknowledges the boundary of a researcher's subjective orientation and its influence on how ambiguity is exposed and mediated in research (being), characterizes knowledge as produced through the process of making boundary judgments, generating a partial, contextual, and provisional frame (knowing), and situates a researcher as part of the complexity they seek to understand, rendering any boundary process as a form of intervention that reinforces or marginalizes certain frames and, in turn, influences action (intervening). Our recommendations for sustainability scientists to operationalize ambiguity include (1) nurturing the reflexive capacities of transdisciplinary researchers to navigate persistent ambiguity (e.g., using our proposed framework of RBC), and (2) grappling with the potential for and consequences of theoretical incommensurability and discordant pluralism. Our findings can help sustainability scientists give shape to and embrace ambiguity as a fundamental part of rigorous sustainability science.
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Affiliation(s)
- Anita Lazurko
- School of Environment, Resources, and Sustainability, University of Waterloo, 200 University Avenue W, N2L 3G1 Waterloo, Canada
- UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Library Avenue, Bailrigg, Lancaster, LA1 4AP UK
| | - L. Jamila Haider
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Tilman Hertz
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Simon West
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden
- Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- Northern Institute, Charles Darwin University, Darwin, Australia
| | - Daniel D. P. McCarthy
- School of Environment, Resources, and Sustainability, University of Waterloo, 200 University Avenue W, N2L 3G1 Waterloo, Canada
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Haider LJ, Schlüter M, Folke C, Reyers B. Rethinking resilience and development: A coevolutionary perspective. Ambio 2021; 50:1304-1312. [PMID: 33566331 PMCID: PMC8116373 DOI: 10.1007/s13280-020-01485-8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/30/2020] [Revised: 11/13/2020] [Accepted: 12/15/2020] [Indexed: 05/03/2023]
Abstract
The interdependence of social and ecological processes is broadly acknowledged in the pursuit to enhance human wellbeing and prosperity for all. Yet, development interventions continue to prioritise economic development and short-term goals with little consideration of social-ecological interdependencies, ultimately undermining resilience and therefore efforts to deliver development outcomes. We propose and advance a coevolutionary perspective for rethinking development and its relationship to resilience. The perspective rests on three propositions: (1) social-ecological relationships coevolve through processes of variation, selection and retention, which are manifest in practices; (2) resilience is the capacity to filter practices (i.e. to influence what is selected and retained); and (3) development is a coevolutionary process shaping pathways of persistence, adaptation or transformation. Development interventions affect and are affected by social-ecological relationships and their coevolutionary dynamics, with consequences for resilience, often with perverse outcomes. A coevolutionary approach enables development interventions to better consider social-ecological interdependencies and dynamics. Adopting a coevolutionary perspective, which we illustrate with a case on agricultural biodiversity, encourages a radical rethinking of how resilience and development are conceptualised and practiced across global to local scales.
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Affiliation(s)
- L Jamila Haider
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Kräftriket 2B, 10691, Stockholm, Sweden.
| | - Maja Schlüter
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Kräftriket 2B, 10691, Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Carl Folke
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Kräftriket 2B, 10691, Stockholm, Sweden
- The Beijer Institute of Ecological Economics, The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, 10405, Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Belinda Reyers
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Kräftriket 2B, 10691, Stockholm, Sweden
- Future Africa, University of Pretoria, Hillcrest Campus, Pretoria, South Africa
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Lade SJ, Walker BH, Haider LJ. Resilience as pathway diversity: linking systems, individual, and temporal perspectives on resilience. E&S 2020. [PMID: 0 DOI: 10.5751/es-11760-250319] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 05/06/2023]
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Jamila Haider L, Neusel B, Peterson GD, Schlüter M. Past management affects success of current joint forestry management institutions in Tajikistan. Environ Dev Sustain 2019; 21:2183-2224. [PMID: 32684800 PMCID: PMC7357724 DOI: 10.1007/s10668-018-0132-0] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/03/2017] [Accepted: 03/09/2018] [Indexed: 05/20/2023]
Abstract
In the Pamir Mountains of Eastern Tajikistan, the clearance of mountain forests to provide fuelwood for an increasing population is a major source of environmental degradation. International development organisations have implemented joint forestry management institutions to help restore once-forested mountainous regions, but the success of these institutions has been highly variable. This study uses a multi-method approach, drawing on institutional analysis supported by Elinor Ostrom's design principles and social-ecological system framework in combination with resilience thinking to help understand why some communities in Tajikistan manage their forests more sustainably than others. The application of the design principles provided helpful guidance for practitioners implementing joint forestry management. The social-ecological system analysis revealed both 'history of use' and 'tenant density' as positively associated with forest condition. However, we also identify limitations of snapshot social-ecological assessments. In particular, we illustrate the critical importance of considering historical legacy effects, such as externally imposed centralised governance regimes (that characterise many post-Soviet states) in attempts to understand current management practices. Our work shows how a more nuanced understanding of institutional change and inertia can be achieved by adopting a resilience approach to institutional analysis, focusing on the importance of reorganisation. Lessons learned from our analysis should be widely applicable to common pool resource management in other semi-arid forested landscapes as well as in regions with a strong centralised governance legacy.
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Affiliation(s)
- L. Jamila Haider
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Kräftriket 2B, 106 91 Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Benjamin Neusel
- Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusamenarbeit (GIZ), GIZ Office Tanzania, 65 Ali Hassan Mwinyi Road, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
| | - Garry D. Peterson
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Kräftriket 2B, 106 91 Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Maja Schlüter
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Kräftriket 2B, 106 91 Stockholm, Sweden
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Haider LJ, Hentati-Sundberg J, Giusti M, Goodness J, Hamann M, Masterson VA, Meacham M, Merrie A, Ospina D, Schill C, Sinare H. The undisciplinary journey: early-career perspectives in sustainability science. Sustain Sci 2018; 13:191-204. [PMID: 30147779 PMCID: PMC6086269 DOI: 10.1007/s11625-017-0445-1] [Citation(s) in RCA: 20] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/17/2016] [Accepted: 06/06/2017] [Indexed: 05/21/2023]
Abstract
The establishment of interdisciplinary Master's and PhD programs in sustainability science is opening up an exciting arena filled with opportunities for early-career scholars to address pressing sustainability challenges. However, embarking upon an interdisciplinary endeavor as an early-career scholar poses a unique set of challenges: to develop an individual scientific identity and a strong and specific methodological skill-set, while at the same time gaining the ability to understand and communicate between different epistemologies. Here, we explore the challenges and opportunities that emerge from a new kind of interdisciplinary journey, which we describe as 'undisciplinary.' Undisciplinary describes (1) the space or condition of early-career researchers with early interdisciplinary backgrounds, (2) the process of the journey, and (3) the orientation which aids scholars to address the complex nature of today's sustainability challenges. The undisciplinary journey is an iterative and reflexive process of balancing methodological groundedness and epistemological agility to engage in rigorous sustainability science. The paper draws upon insights from a collective journey of broad discussion, reflection, and learning, including a survey on educational backgrounds of different generations of sustainability scholars, participatory forum theater, and a panel discussion at the Resilience 2014 conference (Montpellier, France). Based on the results from this diversity of methods, we suggest that there is now a new and distinct generation of sustainability scholars that start their careers with interdisciplinary training, as opposed to only engaging in interdisciplinary research once strong disciplinary foundations have been built. We further identify methodological groundedness and epistemological agility as guiding competencies to become capable sustainability scientists and discuss the implications of an undisciplinary journey in the current institutional context of universities and research centers. In this paper, we propose a simple framework to help early-career sustainability scholars and well-established scientists successfully navigate what can sometimes be an uncomfortable space in education and research, with the ultimate aim of producing and engaging in rigorous and impactful sustainability science.
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Affiliation(s)
- L. Jamila Haider
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden
| | | | - Matteo Giusti
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Julie Goodness
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Maike Hamann
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden
- Centre for Complex Systems in Transition, Stellenbosch University, Stellenbosch, South Africa
| | | | - Megan Meacham
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Andrew Merrie
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Daniel Ospina
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden
- The Beijer Institute of Ecological Economics, The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Caroline Schill
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden
- The Beijer Institute of Ecological Economics, The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Hanna Sinare
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden
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Lade SJ, Haider LJ, Engström G, Schlüter M. Resilience offers escape from trapped thinking on poverty alleviation. Sci Adv 2017; 3:e1603043. [PMID: 28508077 PMCID: PMC5415336 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.1603043] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/09/2016] [Accepted: 03/05/2017] [Indexed: 05/03/2023]
Abstract
The poverty trap concept strongly influences current research and policy on poverty alleviation. Financial or technological inputs intended to "push" the rural poor out of a poverty trap have had many successes but have also failed unexpectedly with serious ecological and social consequences that can reinforce poverty. Resilience thinking can help to (i) understand how these failures emerge from the complex relationships between humans and the ecosystems on which they depend and (ii) navigate diverse poverty alleviation strategies, such as transformative change, that may instead be required. First, we review commonly observed or assumed social-ecological relationships in rural development contexts, focusing on economic, biophysical, and cultural aspects of poverty. Second, we develop a classification of poverty alleviation strategies using insights from resilience research on social-ecological change. Last, we use these advances to develop stylized, multidimensional poverty trap models. The models show that (i) interventions that ignore nature and culture can reinforce poverty (particularly in agrobiodiverse landscapes), (ii) transformative change can instead open new pathways for poverty alleviation, and (iii) asset inputs may be effective in other contexts (for example, where resource degradation and poverty are tightly interlinked). Our model-based approach and insights offer a systematic way to review the consequences of the causal mechanisms that characterize poverty traps in different agricultural contexts and identify appropriate strategies for rural development challenges.
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Affiliation(s)
- Steven J. Lade
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, 106 91 Stockholm, Sweden
- Fenner School of Environment and Society, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory 2601, Australia
- Corresponding author. (S.J.L.); (L.J.H.)
| | - L. Jamila Haider
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, 106 91 Stockholm, Sweden
- Corresponding author. (S.J.L.); (L.J.H.)
| | - Gustav Engström
- The Beijer Institute of Ecological Economics and Global Economic Dynamics and the Biosphere, The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, 104 05 Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Maja Schlüter
- Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, 106 91 Stockholm, Sweden
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Boonstra WJ, Björkvik E, Haider LJ, Masterson V. Human responses to social-ecological traps. Sustain Sci 2016; 11:877-889. [PMID: 30174745 PMCID: PMC6106248 DOI: 10.1007/s11625-016-0397-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 13] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/08/2015] [Accepted: 09/07/2016] [Indexed: 06/08/2023]
Abstract
Social-ecological (SE) traps refer to persistent mismatches between the responses of people, or organisms, and their social and ecological conditions that are undesirable from a sustainability perspective. Until now, the occurrence of SE traps is primarily explained from a lack of adaptive capacity; not much attention is paid to other causal factors. In our article, we address this concern by theorizing the variety of human responses to SE traps and the effect of these responses on trap dynamics. Besides (adaptive) capacities, we theorize desires, abilities and opportunities as important additional drivers to explain the diversity of human responses to traps. Using these theoretical concepts, we construct a typology of human responses to SE traps, and illustrate its empirical relevance with three cases of SE traps: Swedish Baltic Sea fishery; amaXhosa rural livelihoods; and Pamir smallholder farming. We conclude with a discussion of how attention to the diversity in human response to SE traps may inform future academic research and planned interventions to prevent or dissolve SE traps.
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Quinlan AE, Berbés-Blázquez M, Haider LJ, Peterson GD. Measuring and assessing resilience: broadening understanding through multiple disciplinary perspectives. J Appl Ecol 2015. [DOI: 10.1111/1365-2664.12550] [Citation(s) in RCA: 232] [Impact Index Per Article: 25.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/28/2022]
Affiliation(s)
- Allyson E. Quinlan
- Resilience Alliance; Department of Biology; Acadia University; Wolfville NS B4P 2R6 Canada
| | - Marta Berbés-Blázquez
- Geography and Environmental Management; University of Waterloo; 200 University Avenue West Waterloo ON N2L 3G1 Canada
| | - L. Jamila Haider
- Stockholm Resilience Centre; Stockholm University; Kräftriket 2B SE-106 91 Stockholm Sweden
| | - Garry D. Peterson
- Stockholm Resilience Centre; Stockholm University; Kräftriket 2B SE-106 91 Stockholm Sweden
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