Impact of Social-Ecological Linkages on Human-Environment Systems

Human-environment systems, also called social-ecological systems (SES), are characterized by tight, multi-scale interactions between human actors, institutions and the resources and ecosystems they depend on. These linkages determine the co-development of the system over time and its response to internal or external disturbance such as the impact of global change. They can for instance lead to feedbacks that lock the system in its current state and severely limit its potential to adapt to new circumstances. Our knowledge about how the nature of these linkages affects the performance and responses of the coupled system is, however, so far very limited. The SESLINK project aims to address this gap by systematically investigating social-ecological linkages and their impact on the provision of ecosystem services for human well-being with the aim to derive insights for SES governance. Based on a typology of linkages we develop theoretical and empirically-based simulation models to explore SES’ behavior in a range of environments – river basins, land use and marine ecosystems. Using this interdisciplinary model-based exploration we aim to identify characteristics of social-ecological feedbacks or configurations of feedbacks that can explain patterns of system behavior within or across different contexts. In this talk I will present first results of theoretical model exploration of an irrigation case study and discuss lessons learned from this exercise for the analysis of SES and SES governance, particularly the development of adaptation strategies and pathways towards more sustainable resource or ecosystem use.