Polycrisis Resource Library

The Polycrisis Resource Library is a growing collection of media that help to understand polycrisis, develop strategies to address polycrisis, and build a field of polycrisis analysis.

Evolution of the Polycrisis: Anthropocene Traps that Challenge Global Sustainability

November 13, 2023

Peter Søgaard Jørgensen, Raf E. V. Jansen, Daniel I. Avila Ortega, Lan Wang-Erlandsson, Jonathan F. Donges, Henrik Österblom, Per Olsson, Magnus Nyström, Steven J. Lade, Thomas Hahn, Carl Folke, Garry D. Peterson and Anne-Sophie Crépin

In this article, the authors, inspired by the polycrisis, identify and explore potential 14 traps affecting humanity in the global human context, brought about by the trajectory of our increasing…

Evolution of the polycrisis: Anthropocene traps that challenge global sustainability

November 13, 2023

Peter Søgaard Jørgensen, Raf E. V. Jansen, Daniel I. Avila Ortega, Lan Wang-Erlandsson, Jonathan F. Donges, Henrik Österblom, Per Olsson, Magnus Nyström, Steven J. Lade, Thomas Hahn, Carl Folke, Garry D. Peterson and Anne-Sophie Crépin

Using expert solicitation, the authors identify 14 “evolutionary traps” (global, technological, and structural) that risk locking humanity into unfavorable (maladaptive) trajectories that seriously restrict its ability to adapt to the…

Navigating the polycrisis—governing for transformation: The 2024 agenda for the systems community

October 30, 2023

Louis Klein, Pamela Buckle, Nam Nguyen, Rika Preiser, Ray Ison

In this article, the authors argue that the polycrisis is the manifestation of challenges outlined by the earlier scholarship of the “global problematique,” a set of systemically related factors including…

Navigating the Polycrisis – Governing for Transformation: The 2024 Agenda for the Systems Community

October 30, 2023

Louis Klein, Pamela Buckle, Nam Nguyen, Rika Preiser, and Ray Ison

The authors argue that the concept of the “global problematique” introduced by the Club of Rome over 50 years ago anticipated what we now call polycrisis by presenting a cybersystemic…

AXA Future Risks Report 2023: A World in Polycrisis

October 30, 2023

AXA

This tenth edition of insurance company AXA’s Future Risks Report surveyed 3,500 experts in 50 countries and a representative sample of 20,000 members of the general population in 15 countries….

Why So Much is Going Wrong at the Same Time

October 18, 2023

Thomas Homer-Dixon

Addressing critiques of the polycrisis concept from the political right and left, Thomas Homer-Dixon argues that the world is in a polycrisis generated by novel and unprecedented conditions, as measured…

Understanding Polycrisis: Definitions, Applications, and Responses

October 5, 2023

Sienna Mark, Samantha Holder, Daniel Hoyer, Rod Schoonover, and Daniel P. Aldrich

This paper compares conceptualizations of the term “polycrisis,” raising questions about the key aspects of different definitions while stressing a convergence in critical features. It conceives a polycrisis as a…

Transformative resilience: the key to governing Europe’s sustainability transitions in the polycrisis

October 1, 2023

The European Environment Agency

The report examines how the polycrisis challenges the European Union’s sustainability transition. It focuses on transformative resilience, the ability to absorb, adapt to, and anticipate shocks while driving systemic change….

Predicament: Our Intertwined Crises. In: Toward Social-Ecological Well-Being

September 15, 2023

Éloi Laurent

In this chapter, the author examines the ongoing unsustainability crisis, connecting various dimensions of sustainability while linking planetary health with inequality and cooperation. Environmental crises such as climate change, ecosystem…

Mitigating Global Warming is Not Our Only Problem: Are We “Sleepwalking” Towards a Global Polycrisis?

September 13, 2023

William White

William White argues that climate policy around the world is lacking in dimensions of “should” (clear analysis of what must be done), “could” (the power to implement solutions), and “would”…

About the Resource Library

The Polycrisis Resource Library includes resources that:

  • Comment on the polycrisis as a concept and as a present global reality
  • Undertake similar analysis using different—but related—concepts
  • Analyze crisis interactions among multiple global systems

Though not exhaustive, the Library strives to present a diverse representation of views on different aspects of the polycrisis discussion, and will be updated as that discussion evolves. Search for resources with the keyword search bar, or by using the drop-down menus to filter for type of resource, global systems addressed, and key themes.

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