Appendix 2: Human-Environment Systems (HESs) as Complex
Adaptive Systems
Authors
Madhur Anand (University of Guelph)
Chris Bauch (University of Guelph)
Jacques Bélair (University of Montreal)
John Harer (Duke University)
Nina Fefferman (Rutgers University)
Eugenia Kalnay (University of Maryland)
Linda Ness (Telcordia)
Peter March (Ohio State University)
Jorge Rivas (University of Minnesota)
James Watmough (University of New Brunswick)
Charge to the Group:
Under this theme, the group is asked to focus on the dynamics, both endogenous and in
response to outside disturbance, of coupled Human-Environment Systems (HES). Key
questions regarding the dynamics of HESs relate to the ways in which their behaviors
emerge from adaptive actions by their constituent agents, interacting across multiple
scales. Addressing such questions will require new mathematics-based theories that
must merge holistic and reductionistic perspectives, integrate physical, social, and
biological sciences, and scale from the genomic to the biosphere. Societies are complex
adaptive systems, composed of individual agents who have their own priorities, and who
value the macroscopic features of their societies differently. Resolving those competing
perspectives is at the core of addressing sustainability. Under this theme, the group is
asked to develop research themes and related questions that focus on integrating
advances in the theory and mathematical modeling of complex adaptive systems (CAS)
with rich empirical work on the actual dynamics of coupled HES and to explore the
relevance of new tools in CAS research for addressing their interactions.
- Introduction
Sustainability science spans more fields of science than most other
interdisciplinary scientific efforts, and yet it can be argued that no science of
sustainability is complete unless is examines interactions between human systems and
environmental systems (both physical and biological) at multiple scales. It is well known
that environmental systems are heavily impacted by the activities of highly organized
human societies, and it is also increasingly recognized that environmental systems in
turn feed back upon human systems. In addition to this complex feedback loop
connecting environmental systems and human systems, societies themselves are highly
complex, consisting of “individual agents who have their own priorities, and who value
the macroscopic features of their societies differently” (Levin and Clark 2010, p. 22).
A highly suitable conceptual language for the types of interactions seen in
coupled human-environment systems is provided by complex adaptive systems (CAS).
Complex adaptive systems are defined by several key features: “CAS are composed of
agents that interact locally in time and space based on information they use to respond