Academic Journal Article

A Dynamic Network Model of Societal Complexity and Resilience Inspired by Tainter’s Theory of Collapse

This study examines the dynamics of societal collapse based on Joseph Tainter’s theory of the “collapse of complex societies.” It explores how rising societal complexity influences productivity and the likelihood of collapse. The findings show that increasing complexity, driven by external stresses, increases the risk of collapse, highlighting the direct link between complexity and vulnerability […]

A Dynamic Network Model of Societal Complexity and Resilience Inspired by Tainter’s Theory of Collapse Read More »

Polycrisis in the Anthropocene: An Invitation to Contributions and Debates

This commentary introduces “Polycrisis in the Anthropocene,” a special issue of Global Sustainability journal. It elaborates upon three major contributions of the issue’s lead article, “Global Polycrisis: The Causal Mechanisms of Crisis Entanglement,” and it explores three key debates surrounding the polycrisis concept: Are we in a polycrisis, at risk of a polycrisis, or neither?

Polycrisis in the Anthropocene: An Invitation to Contributions and Debates Read More »

Global Polycrisis: The Causal Mechanisms of Crisis Entanglement

The authors translate polycrisis from a loose concept into a research agenda by providing the concept with a substantive definition, highlighting its value-added in comparison to related concepts, and developing a theoretical framework to explain the causal mechanisms currently entangling many of the world’s crises. In this framework, a global crisis arises when one or

Global Polycrisis: The Causal Mechanisms of Crisis Entanglement Read More »

Evolution of the Polycrisis: Anthropocene Traps that Challenge Global Sustainability

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 complexity and influence on the Earth system. These traps are then categorized as global, technological, or structural traps and then further assessed to produce statistical

Evolution of the Polycrisis: Anthropocene Traps that Challenge Global Sustainability Read More »

Evolution of the polycrisis: Anthropocene traps that challenge global sustainability

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 Anthropocene. These traps develop over four phases: initiation, scaling, masking (of harmful interactions), and trapping. The fourth phase involves one of five trapping mechanisms: constraints,

Evolution of the polycrisis: Anthropocene traps that challenge global sustainability Read More »

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

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 political, social, and ecological challenges such as pollution, resource depletion, and population growth. The polycrisis is recognized as the outcome of profound governance crises that

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

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

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 perspective on the linkages between multiple challenges. They warn that the polycrisis concept could suffer the same fate as global problematique by changing discourse but

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

Earth Beyond Six of Nine Planetary Boundaries

The authors present an updated analysis of the planetary boundaries framework, revealing that human activities have pushed Earth beyond six of the nine critical environmental thresholds that define a safe operating space for humanity. These transgressed boundaries include climate change, biosphere integrity, land-system change, freshwater use, biogeochemical flows, and novel entities. The study emphasizes that

Earth Beyond Six of Nine Planetary Boundaries Read More »

The Polycrisis

Ville Lähde explores various considerations involved in the coining of new terms and concepts, such as polycrisis. He highlights in particular the difference between those who speak of the polycrisis as a totalizing description of the present era and its existential problems, and those who speak of a polycrisis “as a technical concept with which

The Polycrisis Read More »

The Human Ecology of Overshoot: Why a Major ‘Population Correction’ is Inevitable

Using an evolutionary ecology perspective, William E. Rees argues that modern techno-industrial society is in a state of advanced ecological overshoot. Fossil fuels have enabled a massive expansion of humanity that constitutes the most globally significant ecological phenomena in 250 000 years of human evolutionary history. He concludes that humanity is exhibiting the dynamic of

The Human Ecology of Overshoot: Why a Major ‘Population Correction’ is Inevitable Read More »

Scroll to Top