Adapting risk assessments for a complex future

Abstract

Human activities have progressively eroded the biosphere basis for our societies and introduced various risks. To navigate these risks, or potential undesirable outcomes of the future, we need tools and an understanding of how to assess risk in a complex world. Risk assessments are a powerful tool to address sustainability challenges. However, two issues currently hamper their ability to deal with sustainability risks: the limited sustainability science engagement with the multifaceted nature of risk and the lack of integration of social-ecological, complex, and resilience thinking into risk assessment. In this Perspective, we review and synthesize the wide range of risk definitions and uses and juxtapose them with knowledge on complex adaptive social-ecological systems. Through this synthesis, we highlight the strengths of each risk approach and outline five challenges that, if overcome, could turn risk assessments into a much-needed multifaceted toolbox for dealing with the certain uncertainty of a complex future. ll

Aligning conservation and public health goals to tackle unsustainable trade of mammals

“…Further research should investigate and prioritize data‐poor species using methods that are more robust to missing data (e.g., bootstrapping to simulate missing data points). A risk assessment framework could also be useful to identify understudied but potentially high‐scoring species for which precautionary management is needed given poor data availability (Wassénius & Crona 2022). Finally, the classification of species as high‐priority is relative to other species' CHT score, thus, the CHT index might change depending on the pool of species evaluated, and high‐priority species should be reassessed under scenarios in which species are reclassified by the IUCN‐Red list.…”

“…Finally, it is important to emphasize that because of these limitations, the index we present here contains substantial uncertainty. While uncertainty is pervasive and unavoidable in many conservation and management prioritization settings, novel quantitative approaches can help minimize uncertainty and should be explored in future efforts (Johnson & Gelder 2019; McCarthy 2014; Wassénius & Crona 2022). Given this uncertainty, we suggest that this type of cross‐discipline prioritization approach could be refined and improved upon for other sectors interested in achieving mutual goals within a planetary health framework.…”

National Climate Change Risk Assessments to inform adaptation policy priorities and environmental sustainability outcomes: a knowledge systems perspective

“…These challenges suggest national CCRA knowledge systems require both a pluralistic approach, to interpret risk according to differential values (e.g. Ministry for the Environment 2019 ), and a systems diagnostic approach to help develop and evaluate coherent, robust, adaptation policy strategies that manage risks/opportunities according to key factors (existing and emerging) (Wassénius and Crona 2022 ). Knowledge systems also require further development to integrate both natural and human adaptive capacity in socioecological systems including distinctions between intrinsic adaptive capability and adaptation opportunity, and hence synergies with different response strategies (Berry et al 2013 ; Preiser et al 2018 ).…”

“…Risks are key foci for a CCRA, but risk itself has multiple meanings. Hence, characterising risk for policy purposes can be complicated by varying interpretations, both subjective and objective (Krebs 2011;Wassénius and Crona 2022;Smith et al 2022). Although climate science has evolved a common understanding of risk, differences remain amongst policymakers and wider society that influence risk communication (Tangney 2019).…”

“…Climate change and environmental degradation are increasingly recognised as topmost global priorities, fundamentally linked for human wellbeing in terms of sustainability risks (Pörtner et al 2021;Wassénius and Crona 2022). Environmental sustainability objectives thus prioritise development pathways that protect the long-term integrity and functioning of biodiversity and ecosystems on which humans depend (Kuhlman and Farrington 2010).…”