Resilience: The emergence of a perspective for social–ecological systems analyses

A safe operating space for humanity

“…The second is the work on understanding essential Earth System processes (Bretherton 1988, Schellnhuber 1999, Steffen et al 2004, including human actions Munn 1986, Turner et al 1990), brought together in the evolution of global change research towards Earth System science and in the development of sustainability science (Clark and Dickson 2003). The third is the framework of resilience (Holling 1973;Gunderson and Holling 2002;Walker et al 2004;Folke 2006) and its links to complex dynamics (Kaufmann 1993;Holland 1996) and self-regulation of living systems (Lovelock 1979;Levin 1999), emphasizing multiple basins of attraction and thresholds effects (Scheffer et al 2001;Folke et al 2004;Biggs et al 2009). …”

Sensitivity of health sector indicators' response to climate change in Ghana

“…The readiness of public health systems to adapt to the impacts of climate change has been described as facing delays because of limitations on the inclusion of social-ecological concepts in the planning process (Deppisch and Hasibovic, 2013;Downes et al, 2013;Few, 2007;Folke, 2006;Gallopin, 2006). For example, large-scale environmental changes such as biochemical pollution, extreme temperature events, loss of biodiversity and ecosystem services occur simultaneously, and will have cumulative and interactive adverse impacts on population health (Houghton and English, 2014;Sheridan and Allen, 2015;Zell, 2004).…”

“…This is because the expansion will allow indicators from non-health sectors to be incorporated into public health management strategies towards resilience building (Linnenluecke and Griffiths, 2012;Pascal et al, 2012). Resilience defines the capacity for self-organization and adaptation to stress and change (Folke, 2006;Leichenko and O'Brien, 2008;Walker et al, 2006). Therefore, resilience has the potential to reduce the damages or increase benefits attributed to climate change (Alberini et al, 2006;Walker et al, 2006).…”

“…This is because the role that social-ecological systems play in building resilience of the health sector has eluded the debate on climate change and health due to limited knowledge on the fundamental determinants of resilience, how to manage it, by whom, and which indicators to use for monitoring. Thus, social or ecological systems need to absorb disturbances whilst retaining the same basic structure and ways of functioning after a shock or stress (Folke, 2006;Leichenko and O'Brien, 2008;Luthar and Cicchetti, 2000). Table 2 suggests that the relevance of the indicators was significant in relation to whether or not the influence of indicators on health response was direct, indirect or concurrent.…”

The ecological sustainability trigon – A proposed conceptual framework for creating and testing management scenarios

“…Therefore, the application of resilience-based management, for instance, represents a novel and opportune approach to marine ecosystems, namely regarding fisheries, shifting the focus from conservation of targeted (often commercially important) species to active management of functional groups that support essential processes and sustain ecosystems services (Hughes et al, 2005). The fundamental difference is that this focus on functional groups recognises the importance of ecological roles (including the role of humans) and of species interactions for sustaining ecosystems resilience across temporal and spatial scales (Folke, 2006).…”