Socioecological System Transformation: Lessons from COVID-19
Abstract
:1. Introduction
2. Complex Systems, Socioecological Resilience, and the COVID-19 Shock
- Ecological limits to growth: On a finite planet, there are biophysical limits to complexity and growth. All health innovations and systems—whether investments in clean water or an HIV vaccine—come with a biophysical cost and proceed at the expense of “ecological space” elsewhere in the system [8].
- Ecological limits to societal connectivity: Tackling problems of culture, justice, health, and social change in relation to health presents new challenges. Societal connectivity both creates the conditions for cherished gains in social justice and wellbeing and at the same time exacerbates risks associated with tightly coupled socioecological systems.
- Geopolitical constraints regarding trade relations: Peak globalization and an emerging consensus that the West’s relationship with international partners has become very dependent may see a systemic shift away from outsourcing labor intensive manufacturing to East Asia and the re-emergence of more capital-intensive production within Western economies.
- Reimagining the importance of “care”: We are increasingly faced with a tradeoff between capital intensive medical technologies that depend on growth, and improvements in public health that involve the reordering of social relationships and institutions, including more localized solutions.
3. Prefigurative Politics and Resilience
4. Systemic Change and the Importance of Alternative Ontologies
5. Dominant Regimes under Question
6. Cooperation and Prosocial Behaviors
- How can right and left visions of localism be reconciled?
- What should be the appropriate balance between global economic integration and local sufficiency?
- What do more locally based, public-health-oriented, and less medicalized health systems look like?
- What are the systemic dangers of moving in this direction?
6.1. Cooperative and Prosocial Example: Makers during COVID-19
6.2. Tradeoffs and Uncertainy in Complex Systems
- Steady states are always provisional and temporary: Any ecological or socioeconomic equilibrium produced by an evolutionary, path-dependent process is likely to be dynamic and generative of endogenous processes of transformation.
- What is good for the system is not necessarily good for individuals or groups within that system: Wholesale system change involving “creative destruction” necessarily involves bad and even catastrophic outcomes for individuals. We are comfortable with this when talking about forest fires or fisheries, but less so when those involved are human.
- Alternative pathways embody very difficult tradeoffs involving cherished values and priorities: Possible or conceivable political and socioeconomic configurations exist on a “landscape” that defines the relationship between different parameters and phenomena. Any particular configuration cannot occupy different positions in such a landscape simultaneously.
- Viable alternatives may not be visible: What is perceived as “possible” or viable depends greatly on discourse (the hegemonic “common sense”) but also on the vantage point of the present state of affairs. Large areas of the landscape of the “adjacent possible” may not be visible.
7. Conclusions
Author Contributions
Funding
Institutional Review Board Statement
Informed Consent Statement
Data Availability Statement
Conflicts of Interest
References
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Kish, K.; Zywert, K.; Hensher, M.; Davy, B.J.; Quilley, S. Socioecological System Transformation: Lessons from COVID-19. World 2021, 2, 15-31. https://doi.org/10.3390/world2010002
Kish K, Zywert K, Hensher M, Davy BJ, Quilley S. Socioecological System Transformation: Lessons from COVID-19. World. 2021; 2(1):15-31. https://doi.org/10.3390/world2010002
Chicago/Turabian StyleKish, Kaitlin, Katharine Zywert, Martin Hensher, Barbara Jane Davy, and Stephen Quilley. 2021. "Socioecological System Transformation: Lessons from COVID-19" World 2, no. 1: 15-31. https://doi.org/10.3390/world2010002