Complex Social-ecological Systems and Environmental Shocks: A Threat for International Security
Speaker: Natalini, D. (Global Sustainability Institute, Anglia Ruskin University)
Date: 22 October 2020
Speaker Session Summary
SMA hosted a speaker session as a part of its SMA UK MoD Speaker Series, featuring Dr. Davide Natalini (Global Sustainability Institute, Anglia Ruskin University).
Dr. Natalini began the presentation with an overview of complex social-ecological systems, or how different dynamics between social systems and ecological systems interact and create certain dynamics, such as climate change. He stated that there are four key properties of complex systems. The first is numerosity, or the accumulation of multiple components. The second is non-linearity, or the presence of thresholds that can cause regime shifts. There is also interconnectedness, or the interactions between components and sub-systems. Finally, there is emergence, or characteristics or behaviors resulting from a complex system that could not be captured by merely studying its singular components in isolation. When we refer to interactions between humans and nature, we refer to them as complex social-ecological systems. This framework emphasizes that humans must be seen as a part of nature, as opposed to apart from it, Dr. Natalini explained. Furthermore, human activities have a profound impact on the ecological system, which in turn affects human activities. Biodiversity and connected ecosystem services continue to be destroyed, and one-fifth of the world’s countries are at risk of their ecosystems collapsing due to the destruction of wildlife and their habitats.
Dr. Natalini then offered real-life examples of how social-ecological dynamics work. He cited fires in the Amazon Rainforest, the loss of insects, and eutrophication as ecological outcomes of human behavior and the repercussions of social-ecological dynamics. On the other end of the spectrum, social repercussions can result from ecological effects, such as food and fuel riots and virus outbreaks. Furthermore, environmental dynamics can act as further stressors, which can inevitably lead to conflict and unrest.
Next, Dr. Natalini shifted the discussion towards drivers of virus outbreaks and the environmental dynamics that can lead to them. Studies on virus transmission resulting from animal-human interaction pre-date COVID-19, Dr. Natalini explained. Recent research also demonstrates that two main human drivers have facilitated the transmission of zoonotic viruses to humans. The first is the decreasing distance between humans and wildlife due to deforestation and wild habitat conversion. The second is the increasing rates of extinction of big mammals and increasing populations of small rodents, who are more prone to carry zoonotic diseases. Furthermore, stress hormones can suppress animals’ immune systems, enabling a virus to spread more easily. Therefore, more pandemic outbreaks are likely to occur if biodiversity and the distance between humans and nature decrease. Increased interconnectivity in complex social-ecological systems—or in networks, such as the internet, international trade, and finance systems—connect our complex social ecological system in order to increase the density, capacity, and speed of connections, Dr. Natalini stated. This makes the system more interconnected and opaque. More complex and opaque systems are more difficult to understand, and behaviors are therefore more difficult to predict.
To conclude, Dr. Natalini used Lebanon as an illustration of a cascading social-ecological crisis. Before COVID-19, Lebanon was already in a fragile situation—there was a complex political system legacy in place due to a civil war, water scarcity, mismanagement of service provisions, and its receipt of many Syrian refugees. Once COVID-19 hit, the unrest and food price inflation increased even more drastically. Dr. Natalini explained that this is an empirical example of how fragile conditions can be further exacerbated by environmental shocks that travel through networks and result in increased conflict on the ground.
Speaker Session Recording
Note: We are aware that many government IT providers have blocked access to YouTube from government machines during the pandemic in response to bandwidth limitations. We recommend viewing the recording on YouTube from a non-government computer or listening to the audio file (below), if you are in this position.
Comments