Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Journal of Environmental Management
Journal of Environmental Management
Research article
a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t
Article history: Scholars from many different intellectual disciplines have attempted to measure, estimate, or quantify
Received 15 August 2017 resilience. However, there is growing concern that lack of clarity on the operationalization of the concept
Received in revised form will limit its application. In this paper, we discuss the theory, research development and quantitative
29 January 2018
approaches in ecological and community resilience. Upon noting the lack of methods that quantify the
Accepted 30 January 2018
complexities of the linked human and natural aspects of community resilience, we identify several
promising approaches within the ecological resilience tradition that may be useful in filling these gaps.
Further, we discuss the challenges for consolidating these approaches into a more integrated perspective
Keywords:
Ecological resilience
for managing social-ecological systems.
Community resilience Published by Elsevier Ltd.
Social-ecological systems
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvman.2018.01.083
0301-4797/Published by Elsevier Ltd.
354 W.C. Chuang et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 213 (2018) 353e362
more holistic assessment of social-ecological systems. resilience (Folke et al., 2004). For example, many systems have been
examined quantitatively using early warning signals (EWSs) of
regime shifts in time series data (e.g., Carpenter and Brock, 2006;
1.1. Ecological resilience Dakos et al., 2008; Spanbauer et al., 2014), and in empirical
studies in the lab (e.g., testing EWSs in microcosm experiments;
Ecological resilience is a measure of the amount of change an Drake and Griffen, 2010), as well as assessing EWSs in whole lake
ecosystem can absorb before it shifts from one regime to a new ecosystem manipulations (Carpenter et al., 2011).
regime characterized by a different set of processes and structures
(Holling, 1973). Thus, ecological resilience expands upon the idea of 1.2. Community resilience
single equilibria to include multiple regimes. Over the past several
decades, there has been an increased focus on research in ecological Timmerman's work on society's resilience to the impacts of
resilience and many other concepts closely related to resilience climate change described resilience as “the measure of a system's
(Donohue et al., 2013). One of the terms confused with ecological or parts of a system's capacity to absorb and recover from the
resilience is recovery, which is the time required for a system to occurrence of a hazardous event” (Timmerman, 1981 P.21). Since
return to equilibrium after a perturbation. Recovery was termed then, this concept has been used to study aspects of resilience in
‘engineering resilience’ by Holling (1996) to differentiate it from human and social systems (Janssen, 2001; Manyena, 2006; Vogel
ecological resilience. Although recovery is an important component et al., 2007). Later research expanded the definition of perturba-
of resilience, it does not fully encompass ecological resilience, tion from natural hazards to any impact that may change the
because it leaves out the essential property of multiple regimes and functions and structure of human society. Resilience at the human
thus the possibility of regime shifts and transformations among community level is therefore treated “as the ability of groups or
different regimes. This point is critical, as this difference in under- communities to cope with external stress and disturbances when
standing of the dynamics of social-ecological systems is one of the undergoing any social, political or environmental change” (Adger,
key differences between ecological and community resilience. In 2000). In addition, some studies of community resilience largely
the literature, characterizations of community resilience typically focus on normative criteria. For example, Norris et al. (2008)
do not account for the possibility of multiple regimes in social- defined resilience as “a process linking a set of networked adap-
ecological systems, and therefore reflect an engineering resilience tive capacities to a positive trajectory of functioning and adaption in
perspective. constituent populations after a disturbance.”
Engineering (and community) resilience can be depicted by a The general focus of community resilience has been to under-
single regime (Fig. 1a), where the system condition varies within a stand how individuals, households, and communities deal with
“steady-state” represented by one basin of attraction, while internal or external forces of change without compromising their
ecological resilience is depicted as a complex landscape (Fig. 1b), well-being. Berkes and Ross (2012) identified two major research
with multiple basins representing alternate regimes. Although strands of community resilience: psychological and social-
there has been theoretical and empirical development of the ecological. In the psychological interpretation, “environment”
concept of ecological resilience (e.g., Gunderson, 2000), quantita- often refers to the social, rather than the biophysical environment
tive measures of resilience and the factors that contribute to its (Berkes and Ross, 2012). The majority of the literature emphasizes
erosion are necessary for it to be valuable as a tool for ecosystem psychological well-being at the individual level, and a community
management (Angeler et al., 2016). Observations of regime shifts in member's ability to adapt under extenuating circumstances. In this
social-ecological systems (see Gunderson and Pritchard, 2002) context, the social-ecological approach to community resilience
have served as case studies of ecological resilience, which resulted refers to the capacity of a system to continually change and adapt,
in a push to develop quantitative methods to assess ecological and yet remain within specific (desirable) regimes (Berkes and
Ross, 2012). Likewise, Walker et al. (2004) defined the term as
“the capacity of a system to absorb disturbance and reorganize
while undergoing change so as to still retain essentially the same
function, structure, identity, and feedbacks.” The central concerns
of the social-ecological strand of community resilience include
sustainable livelihoods and disaster resilience. In general, disaster
resilience focuses on a set of capacities and strategies for disaster
readiness (Norris et al., 2008). The purpose of disaster resilience
research is to enhance the ability of a community to prepare and
plan for, absorb, recover from, and adapt to adverse events in a
timely and efficient manner, including the recovery and improve-
ment of basic functions and structures of social systems (Cumming,
2011a; Cumming et al., 2005; Cutter et al., 2014; Gunderson, 2010;
Manyena et al., 2011). In this realm of study, system impacts (per-
turbations) are usually natural hazards in general (Klein et al.,
2003a), extreme events (Cutter et al., 2006, 2008, 2010, 2014) or
coastal disasters (Adger et al., 2005; Klein et al., 2003b). Disaster
resilience scholars are also concerned with the uneven adaptive
capacities among populations and communities (e.g., lack of re-
sources and financial and social capacity to cope with change).
Community resilience, with an explicit emphasis on social di-
mensions, recognizes that “human community relies on ecosystem
Fig. 1. A stability landscape heuristic illustrating the concept of resilience. a) A
services and natural resources for livelihood” (Adger, 2000). That is,
social-ecological system with only one possible regime (i.e., engineering resilience). b) a resilient community depends on sustainable livelihoods, and the
A social-ecological system with many possible regimes (i.e., ecological resilience). loss of resilience is associated with negative impacts on livelihoods.
W.C. Chuang et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 213 (2018) 353e362 355
Therefore, this type of study focuses on identifying the factors (e.g., models or simulations to better understand resilience.
institutions and organizations that affect natural resource man- However, to date, the approach remains narrative-based, for
agement) and linkages across organizational levels that could it conceptually analyzes and describes the system's response
damage, sustain, or promote a community's livelihood. Research in to disturbances and shifts between regimes (Filatova et al.,
this area is often linked to the vulnerability of agricultural/food 2016; Sendzimir et al., 2008, 2011).
systems to climate change. Examples include studies of livelihood (c) Teleconnection metrics: To address non-linear dynamics in a
security of farm communities in the developing world given the nested system (Adger et al., 2009), Eakin et al. (2009)
impact of economic and environmental change on a global scale researched how vulnerabilities and responses of farm
(Eakin et al., 2009), and the study of economic returns (as thresh- households in distinct geographic locations are linked
olds) of dryland grain production systems with and without through spatial and temporal cross-scale processes, called
adaptation to climate change (Antle et al., 2004). teleconnections. Although the concept of teleconnected
vulnerability comprehensively engages the broader
2. Measuring resilience complexity of all cross-scale interactions, this approach is
mainly assessed qualitatively, which limits the research's
2.1. Approaches to assessing community resilience: capacity to explore and quantify the magnitude of reinforc-
conceptualization of community resilience ing and stabilizing feedbacks in a system. In addition,
Akamani (2012) proposed a theoretical model of community
In the field of community resilience, researchers from different resilience for understanding and assessing the sustainability
intellectual traditions frame the research questions and measure of forest-dependent communities. The model captures
community resilience with a variety of metrics and approaches external and internal drivers of change, which is useful for
(Gallopín, 2006). Accordingly, the definition and measurement of studying how factors interact across multiple scales to in-
community resilience remains contested in different academic fluence the process and outcomes of resilience between and
disciplines (Adger, 2000; Angeler and Allen, 2016; Gunderson, within communities.
2010) and there is a lack of consensus on the methods for oper-
ationalizing community resilience. Due to the divergence, two Community resilience has been deeply influenced by the intel-
major issues emerge: (1) there are no widely accepted or lectual debates framing vulnerability, global change and studies of
commonly used quantitative approaches for assessing community natural disaster preparedness. Each of the aforementioned
resilience; and (2) the existing quantitative methods are limited knowledge domain has its own research frame and set of methods
and do not reflect the dynamic and multifaceted characteristics of to conceptualize community resilience, which has led to the lack of
social-ecological systems. Before listing the quantitative methods consensus on the quantitative approaches for assessing community
for assessing community resilience, one must understand that resilience. In the following section, we discuss existing quantitative
community resilience is conceptualized using these metrics: approaches for assessing community resilience.
(a) Place-based resilience metrics: Some researchers have 2.1.1. Agent-based modeling and economic simulations
acknowledged the spatial aspects of community resilience Agent-based modeling can be used to represent social-
and attempted to quantify a so-called “place-based” resil- ecological systems (Hare and Deadman, 2004). Agent-based
ience index within a particular spatial unit (e.g., county, city) models are described as “robotic aggregates responding to a vari-
across various spatial extents, such as a nation or a state able environment, or they simulate complex behavior of humans in
(Cutter et al., 2014; Frazier et al., 2013). Cutter et al. (2008) social networks” (Jopp et al., 2011, p. 164). These models attempt to
proposed a model to improve the comparative assessment give researchers a coherent picture of how particular organisms
of disaster resilience at the local or community level. The would act under specific conditions (Jopp et al., 2011). As an
disaster resilience of place (DROP) model, especially its dy- extension, multi-agent models emphasize the interactions of a
namic aspect, has remained an untested theoretical frame- larger number of autonomously acting agents in a system (Jopp
work. Building on the DROP model, Cutter et al. (2014) et al., 2011). This method has been used to inform ecosystem
created an empirically-based resilience metric known as management (Janssen, 2001) and decision making in coupled
Baseline Resilience Indicators for Communities (BRIC), and human-natural systems (An, 2012). An advantage of agent-based
geographically visualized the sum of the resilience scores modeling is that it can include the spatial dimension of commu-
(Cutter et al., 2014; Frazier et al., 2013). The approach is nity resilience by simulating the change of spatial patterns over
useful to theoretically illustrate temporal changes in the time. This approach has been applied to study the collapse of an
resilience landscape by presenting time-series snapshots. ancient society in northeastern Arizona, as determined by a sharp
However, other key aspects of social-ecological systems, such decline in human population (Axtell et al., 2002), and to explore
as thresholds, cross-scale interactions, and interrelationships social and biophysical dynamics that contributed to deforestation
between each component within scales, are not taken into and forest regrowth (Evans and Kelley, 2008). The simulation sce-
consideration. narios can also help researchers identify the drivers that lead to
(b) Coupled social-ecological metrics: To conceptualize how regime shifts (Filatova et al., 2016). Similarly, Antle et al. (2004)
components of social-ecological systems interrelate with used economic simulation models and coupled process models to
each other at different scales, scholars have introduced tools explore the economic returns of farming, and use these returns as
from system dynamics and system complexity (i.e. Lewison the threshold of a regime shift. Though simulation models can be a
et al., 2016) to study community resilience (Sendzimir useful tool to gain a better understanding of social-ecological
et al., 2008, 2011). In a local-scale case study, Sendzimir resilience, they do not fully represent reality, and validating
et al. (2008) used data collected from participatory group model results can be challenging (Evans and Kelley, 2008).
discussion to identify stakeholder worldviews and the fac-
tors that supported or blocked the transformation from 2.1.2. Quantitative and mixed-methods approaches
conventional river management. Ideally, the system dy- Some research efforts assess community resilience using a
namics approach offers a prototype to build quantitative mixed-methods approach, which combines quantitative and
356 W.C. Chuang et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 213 (2018) 353e362
qualitative methods. Akamani and Hall (2015) used quantitative 2009; Seekell et al., 2011, 2012; Spears et al., 2016). These problems
survey data of 209 households to test a resilience model for a have led to a new frontier of resilience research that emerged in an
forest-dependent community and investigated how type of insti- attempt to address some of the aforementioned issues. Multivariate
tution, capital assets, and other social variables influenced house- indicators such as the Variance Index (VI) and Fisher Information
holds' participation in collaborative forest management (Akamani (FI) were developed to assess change in complex systems using
and Hall, 2015). Kelly et al. (2015) analyzed data from surveying multivariate data combined into a single index, thus avoiding the
twelve stakeholders at different spatial levels of representation and need to know a priori which variable best captures the ecosystem
areas of expertise. Using published statistical data and historical dynamics driving a regime shift (Eason et al., 2014). The VI captures
records of land degradation, they were able to explain the complex the dominant component of variance, while FI is more integrative
interrelationships between community resilience, forest ecosys- and tracks the overall variability in system dynamics (Brock and
tems and land degradation. Perz et al. (2012) assessed social- Carpenter, 2006; Eason et al., 2016). FI is based on information
ecological resilience in the southwestern Amazon region using a theory which has proven useful in assessing ecosystem functioning,
similar approach. In addition to interviewing community members stability, complexity and diversity (Fath et al., 2003), retrospec-
to gather information on their livelihood diversity, adaptive ca- tively identifying regime shifts (e.g., Eason et al., 2016; Spanbauer
pacity (a community's emergency response to crisis, such as wild et al., 2014) and more recently in examining spatial and temporal
fire caused by drought), and collective memory of migration, they patterns in terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems (Eason et al., 2016;
included the spatial assessment of connectivity (defined as prox- Sundstrom et al., 2017). Additionally, there is evidence that FI is
imity to markets and access to paved roads) as a measure of com- capable of detecting impending regime shifts with more clarity and
munity resilience. Perz et al. (2012) quantitatively compared advanced warning when compared to traditional EWSs in complex,
community resilience by region using 229 survey samples; how- multivariate systems (Eason et al., 2014).
ever, this approach does not consider the changing status of a
system, nor its feedbacks, thresholds, and regime shifts. 2.2.2. Cross-scale resilience model, discontinuity hypothesis and
time series modeling
2.2. Quantitative approaches for assessing ecological resilience Early warning indicators and integrated multivariate indicators
are intended to predict/identify regime shifts based on generic
Quantifying resilience has proven challenging, as much of the signals that occur across ecosystems. It has been argued that the
research on quantitative approaches for assessing ecological resil- reason some EWSs do not provide adequate warning is because
ience has focused on the detection of EWSs that indicate an they are not scale-specific, or they focus on the wrong scale (Nash
impending regime shift, rather than directly measuring the innate et al., 2014). That is, EWSs do not account for the hierarchical or-
degree of system resilience at a given point in time (see Carpenter ganization of ecosystems, an inherent property whereby patterns
and Brock, 2006; Scheffer et al., 2015); however, a number of these and processes are manifested and operate at different scales of
approaches may be useful for assessing aspects of community space and time.
resilience. In this section, we do not treat all the methods available, Perhaps the simplest and most common method to quantify
but rather methods for quantifying ecological resilience that appear resilience is that of the cross-scale resilience model and its atten-
promising for managing social-ecological systems. dant discontinuity hypothesis, which explicitly incorporates scales
(Angeler at el. 2016). Current approaches to identify scales based on
2.2.1. Early warning signals the discontinuity hypothesis (Holling, 1992) complement EWSs.
Early warning signals (e.g. critical slowing down and flickering) Aggregations of species (or modes) in body mass distributions
have shown great promise for quantifying ecological resilience. reflect the scales at which resources and structure are available to
Critical slowing down is a measure of the recovery time of a system organisms that have evolved to exploit resources at those specific
after it has been perturbed (Dakos et al., 2008). Detection methods scales (Nash et al., 2013; Stirnemann et al., 2015). In contrast, gaps
for flickering, and other associated dynamics, have also been (discontinuities or troughs) in the distribution reflect the transition
developed for assessing ecosystems. A system may “flicker” be- between structuring processes and thus scaling regimes (Wiens,
tween alternative regimes far from any identifiable thresholds, 1989). At these transitions, there is no ecological structure or
meaning that critical slowing down is less likely to be detectable or resource pattern with which animals can interact, or there is great
present because the system is far from the equilibrium around variance and instability in the structures or patterns (Allen and
which the slowing down happens (Dakos et al., 2013). Measure- Holling, 2008). Countless systems have been successfully exam-
ments of skewness, kurtosis, and mean exit time reflect flickering ined for discontinuities and/or multimodalities in animal body
dynamics of highly stochastic systems. mass distributions, in line with the discontinuity hypothesis (Nash
Early warning signals can be univariate (e.g. a single species) or et al., 2013; Raffaelli et al., 2016; Sundstrom et al., 2012; Thibault
multivariate (e.g., a network of interacting species). These in- et al., 2011; Wardwell et al., 2008).
dicators can be either metric or model-based, with both approaches Once discontinuities are identified, the distribution of functional
attempting to quantify changes in variance properties of a time groups within and across these aggregations can reveal the relative
series but differing in whether or not they attempt to fit the data resilience of a system (of delimited spatial and temporal bounds)
with a specific model structure (Dakos and Bascompte, 2014). Many (Allen et al., 2005). A system with high within-scale diversity of
of the indicators developed to identify critical slowing down and function and high cross-scale redundancy of function is expected to
flickering have been univariate in nature; they have focused on a have a higher capacity to buffer disturbances and remain in the
single (or very few) variables that were known to respond to a same regime (Allen and Holling, 2002). Evidence continues to
particular disturbance (Brock and Carpenter, 2012). However, when accumulate showing that it is functional richness across multiple
the response variable is either unknown or chosen incorrectly, type scales rather than species richness that is critical for buffering ca-
I or II errors may result (Burthe et al., 2015). Indeed, there is much pacity and the long-term persistence of ecosystems (Soliveres et al.,
criticism in the ecological resilience literature of EWSs because 2016). Using discontinuity analysis to identify the intrinsic scales of
many only reliably detect regime shifts after their onset (and thus biological communities may be combined with EWSs to pinpoint
too late for effective management), and their applicability to more sensitive scales that may provide early warning signals of an
complex systems is questionable (Biggs et al., 2009; Scheffer et al., impending threshold (Spanbauer et al., 2016).
W.C. Chuang et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 213 (2018) 353e362 357
Time-series modeling approaches to quantify resilience build and some of the quantitative approaches from ecological and
upon discontinuity analysis and are designed to quantify the spe- community resilience that may be useful for assessing social-
cific resilience of a particular community, such as a phytoplankton ecological systems (Table 1). Since there is limited development
community's response to liming (Angeler et al., 2011; Baho et al., and application of approaches for quantifying community resil-
2014). Discontinuity analysis can be used to make the within and ience, we synthesize our findings by considering quantitative ap-
cross-scale distribution of organisms explicit, which is the first step proaches primarily employed in ecological resilience. These
towards the quantification of resilience in the time-series modeling quantitative approaches developed in ecological resilience appear
approach. Subsequently, dominant temporal frequencies in a useful for assessing the complexities inherent in community
community are identified and the distribution of species (and resilience, and articulating active ways of bridging ecological and
consequently their functions) within and across these scales can community resilience to better assess and manage change in
indicate the community's ability to buffer against disturbances and coupled human and natural systems.
thus its resilience (Angeler et al., 2013).
3.1. Employing EWSs in community resilience
2.2.3. Spatial resilience
Spatial resilience is the contribution of spatial attributes to the Although ecological resilience was defined more than forty
feedbacks that generate resilience in ecosystems and other com- years ago (Holling, 1973), the exponential increase in related
plex systems, and vice versa (Allen et al., 2016). Where long-term research only began in the early 2000s. Previous studies have
data are not available or inference broader than a local case study provided helpful conceptual frameworks to study community
is desired, spatial resilience is an important means of assessing resilience, but their application, and quantitative methods that
resilience. Ecosystems have inherent spatial components and pro- facilitate early intervention, remain rare. Though statistical
cesses that influence resilience at multiple spatial scales (Allen methods have existed for decades in ecological resilience, their
et al., 2016; Cumming, 2011a, b; Nystro € m and Folke, 2001; Zurlini application has been primarily limited to assessment of ecological
et al., 2014). Cumming (2011b) posited that spatial resilience is regime shifts (Andersen et al., 2009; Filatova et al., 2016). However,
governed by interacting spatial characteristics across scales, such as it is important to understand that social-ecological systems can
spatial diversity and heterogeneity of components and processes exist in alternative regimes, which has important implications for
that comprise systems, spatial connectivity within and outside the community resilience as well (Allen et al., 2014). Despite the
system, and how components and processes interact across spatial challenges presented by insufficient data or the desire for long term
scales. The concept of system memory also plays a role: after a temporal studies (Hicks et al., 2016; Nystro € m and Folke, 2001),
disturbance, restoration to the previous state will be more likely if some EWSs have been applied to assess aspects of resilience
spatially-connected areas maintain pre-disturbance components including regime shifts in coupled human and natural systems (e.g.
and processes (Cumming, 2011b; Nystro €m and Folke, 2001). Eason and Cabezas, 2012; Gonzalez-Mejia et al., 2014; Karunanithi
Although approaches to quantifying spatial resilience are rela- et al., 2011; Spielmann et al., 2016; Vance et al., 2017). For example,
tively unexplored, several methods appear promising (e.g., Angeler Spielmann et al. (2016) used EWSs for research on the change of
and Allen, 2016; Cumming, 2011a, b; Sundstrom et al., 2017). In human settlement size and social institutions under the impacts of
landscape ecology, metrics such as spatial heterogeneity, frag- climate change and population relocation in the prehistoric U.S.
mentation, and cross-scale structure influence the persistence of Southwest from 1050 AD to 1375 AD. They detected critical slowing
ecosystems in space and could serve as resilience indicators down before social transformation and concluded that EWSs are
(Cumming, 2011b; Nystro € m and Folke, 2001). Metrics estimating useful for anticipating social change. While these studies capture
connectivity of land cover/land use types can also indicate spatial inherent change in community dynamics and structure (e.g., pop-
resilience. For instance, Zurlini et al. (2014) showed that resilience ulation growth, land and energy use, economic activity), most of
eroded in an Italian rural-urban socio-ecological system as con- them do not include many of the factors of concern within the
nectivity and homogeneity of intensive agricultural and urban community resilience literature (e.g., vulnerability, diversity, haz-
cover types increased. Network theory has potential for assessing ard management).
spatial resilience at local scales (i.e., at individual nodes such as Indicators developed to identify and predict these thresholds in
cities) and at broad scales (i.e., between nodes such as cities within ecosystems need to be easily interpretable and broadly applicable if
a region; Allen et al., 2016). Estimating cross-scale resilience and they are to serve a practical and not just purely theoretical purpose.
discontinuity patterns in space can assess the distribution and scale While EWSs are powerful tools due to their ease of application, the
at which ecological functions occur across spatial extents (Go € the outstanding questions regarding their utility indicates that there is
et al., 2014) and provide warnings of low resilience when func- still more research needed in this area. Some of the challenges
tional redundancy across scales is reduced (Go €the et al., 2014; include the fact that: (1) depending on the dynamics of the system,
Peterson et al., 1998). Spatial modeling can also untangle the rela- some EWSs fail to produce a signal prior to a regime shift (Dakos
tive importance of dominant and rare species, and it has been et al., 2015), (2) regime shifts can occur with no EWSs (Hastings
suggested that this contributes to a more detailed picture of resil- and Wysham, 2010), and (3) EWSs may produce a signal when no
ience as rare species can maintain critical functions in ecosystems critical transition has occurred (Burthe et al., 2015). To combat
by replacing dominant species after perturbations (Angeler et al., some of these challenges, Eason et al. (2016) recommend the use of
2015). multiple quantitative approaches to compare, validate and
augment system evaluations. Moving forward, managing resilience
in social-ecological systems will require novel characterizations of
3. Applying ecological resilience methods to community
system behaviors, and will need to take into account the various
resilience assessments
actors involved in buffering disturbances (Green et al., 2015).
There is limited consensus on the methods for assessing critical
aspects of resilience and accordingly, there is a prevalent need to 3.2. Accounting for scale in community resilience
clarify the concepts and approaches to maximize the utility and
application of the concept. In this work, we discussed the theory Within regimes, ecological and social systems are characterized
358 W.C. Chuang et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 213 (2018) 353e362
Table 1
Similarities and differences between ecological resilience and community resilience.
Ecological Measure of the amount of Diversity, variability, Multiple regimes, multiple Alternative regimes, EWS, regime detection (Eason et al.,
resilience change needed to change an modularity (scales), scales, adaptive and ecosystem change 2014; Dakos et al., 2015; Spanbauer
ecosystem from one set of cross-scale interactions transformative capacity et al., 2016; Sundstrom et al., 2017),
processes and structures to a discontinuity analysis (Nash et al.,
different set of processes and 2013; Raffaelli et al., 2016)
structures (Holling, 1973;
Angeler and Allen, 2016)
Community Many definitions, examples Diversity, variability, Recovery of human Disaster management, Agent-based modeling (Janssen,
resilience include: 1. “The measure of a maintaining system systems, sustainable global environmental 2001; Axtell et al., 2002),
system's, or part of a system's functions, vulnerability livelihoods, disaster change, collapse of societies conceptual frameworks (Cutter
capacity to absorb and recover preparedness, the ability to et al., 2014); EWSs (Spielmann
from the occurrence of a cope with change et al., 2016), economic simulations
hazardous event” (Timmerman, (Antle et al., 2004)
1981). 2. “Qualities of a
community, stemming from
everyday processes, that might
enhance or detract from its
ability to prepare for, respond
to, recover from and mitigate
environmental hazard events”
(Cutter et al., 2014). 3. “The
ability of groups or
communities to cope with
external stress and
disturbances when undergoing
any social, political or
environmental change (Adger,
2000).” 4. “...involves a regime
change in which the structures,
processes, and identity of a
community either evolve into a
more desired configuration or
developed into a less desirable
state (Gunderson, 2010)”
by multiple spatial scales and processes operating at different To study community resilience comprehensively, researchers
speeds (temporal scales) (Allen et al., 2014). Furthermore, regimes need to consider a community's capacity to respond to change and
can exhibit multiple scales in the structure of their components, as where possible, the mechanisms and processes that drive regime
for example, cities cluster into discrete size classes within regions shifts in these social-ecological systems. Ideally, these core con-
(Garmestani et al., 2009). A fundamental difference between cerns should be addressed across spatial and temporal scales.
ecological and community resilience is the manner in which each Ecological resilience is useful for describing social-ecological in-
treats scale (Gunderson, 2010). In practice, community resilience teractions at multiple scales, but hasn't been explicitly employed in
has only been concerned with one level in a system; the scale of a most studies of community resilience. Applying discontinuity
community (e.g., city; neighborhood) (Berkes and Ross, 2016) analysis in community resilience studies offers a way to gain a
(Fig. 2) and is specifically focused on return time to a former regime better understanding of changes in structure and function of social-
post-disturbance. On the other hand, ecological resilience accounts ecological systems. With sufficient time-series data, future studies
for the possibility that return may not be possible, and a system can explore spatial patterns in the analysis including possible
may reorganize into a completely different regime. Without explicit spatial autocorrelation (clustering), and observe how the spatial
consideration of scale, cross-scale interactions, or regime shifts, the and temporal distribution of results adjusts to disturbance and loss
impacts go unnoticed and unchecked until the consequences from natural disasters. Future studies could apply scale-dependent
manifest. discontinuity analysis in analyzing, for example, farm lot size, farm
The dearth of longitudinal data and lack of consistently size (i.e., amount of labor and investment), diversity of agricultural
measured social variables makes the detection of cross-scale pat- products, or productivity per land area or per capita, as a way to
terns of change a difficult task in community resilience. One way to move beyond the limitations of current community resilience ap-
address this problem is to take advantage of existing methodolo- proaches. Identifying discontinuous distributions in social-
gies that explicitly incorporate scale (Angeler et al., 2016). Discon- ecological systems may provide early opportunities for managers
tinuity analysis uses proxies such as population size to identify to intervene or develop the ability to reorganize before a system
scales in relevant systems, and account for cross-scale interactions passes a critical threshold (Spanbauer et al., 2016).
in social-ecological systems. To date, there have only been a few
studies which attempted to detect discontinuous patterns in hu-
man systems; the key system variables used in those studies 3.3. Considering spatial connectivity in community resilience
included city size measured by population (Garmestani et al., 2005,
2007, 2008), firm sizes and their functional richness (Garmestani One of the key tenets of systems thinking is the idea that no
et al., 2006), and gross domestic product (GDP) (Sundstrom et al., action exists in isolation; hence, it is possible for events/actions to
2014) with temporal coverage from a single year to several decades. have cascading effects through processes, time and particularly in
this context, space. The inherent spatial connectivity and
W.C. Chuang et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 213 (2018) 353e362 359
challenges, we submit that it may be possible in future research to Angeler, D.G., Drakare, S., Johnson, R.K., 2011. Revealing the organization of complex
adaptive systems through multivariate time series modeling. Ecol. Soc. 16, 5.
catalyze the convergence of ecological and community resilience
Antle, J.M., Capalbo, S.M., Elliott, E.T., Paustian, K.H., 2004. Adaptation, spatial het-
into an integrated approach by facilitating a deeper understanding erogeneity, and the vulnerability of agricultural systems to climate change and
of coupled human-natural systems, and we hope this paper has CO2 fertilization: an integrated assessment approach. Climatic Change 64,
moved us closer to that goal. Human societies and the environ- 289e315.
Axtell, R.L., Epstein, J.M., Dean, J.S., Gumerman, G.J., Swedlund, A.C., Harburger, J.,
ments they inhabit are incapable of being disentangled, therefore, it Chakravarty, S., Hammond, R., Parker, J., Parker, M., 2002. Population growth
is essential that we gain a holistic understanding of how the and collapse in a multiagent model of the Kayenta Anasazi in long house valley.
resilience of each is deeply intertwined. This research effort is not Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. 99, 7275e7279.
Baho, D.L., Drakare, S., Johnson, R.K., Allen, C.R., Angeler, D.G., 2014. Similar resil-
intended to be exhaustive but is indicative of the type of synergy ience attributes in lakes with different management practices. PLoS ONE 9,
and cross-disciplinary cooperation needed to manage problems e91881.
and promote sustainability in our increasingly complex and inter- Berkes, F., Ross, H., 2012. Community resilience: toward an integrated approach.
Soc. Nat. Resour. 26, 1e16.
connected world. Berkes, F., Ross, H., 2016. Panarchy and community resilience: sustainability science
and policy implications. Environ. Sci. Pol. 61, 185e193.
Biggs, R., Carpenter, S.R., Brock, W.A., 2009. Turning back from the brink: detecting
Acknowledgements
an impending regime shift in time to avert it. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. 106,
826e831.
The authors would like to thank Michael Harrison from the Brock, W.A., Carpenter, S.R., 2006. Variance as a leading indicator of regime shift in
University of Nebraska Lincoln for creating Fig. 1b. This research ecosystem services. Ecol. Soc. 11, 9.
Brock, W.A., Carpenter, S.R., 2012. Early warnings of regime shift when the
was performed while TLS and WC held NRC Research Associateship ecosystem structure is unknown. PLoS ONE 7, e45586.
awards at the U.S. EPA. Financial support from the Swedish Brunson, M.W., 2012. The elusive promise of social-ecological approaches to ran-
Research Councils FORMAS (2014-1193) and VR (2014-5828), and geland management. Rangel. Ecol. Manage. 65, 632e637.
Burthe, S.J., Henrys, P.A., Mackay, E.B., Spears, B.M., Campbell, R., Carvalho, L.,
the August T. Larsson Foundation of the Swedish University of Dudley, B., Gunn, I.D.M., Johns, D.G., Maberly, S.C., May, L., Newell, M.A.,
Agricultural Sciences is acknowledged. The Nebraska Cooperative Wanless, S., Winfield, I.J., Thackeray, S.J., Daunt, F., 2015. Do early warning in-
Fish and Wildlife Research Unit is jointly supported by a coopera- dicators consistently predict nonlinear change in long-term ecological data?
J. Appl. Ecol. 53, 666e676. https://doi.org/10.1111/1365-2664.12519.
tive agreement between the United States Geological Survey, the Carpenter, S.R., Brock, W.A., 2006. Rising variance: a leading indicator of ecological
Nebraska Game and Parks Commission, the University of Nebras- transition. Ecol. Lett. 9, 311e318.
ka Lincoln, the United States Fish and Wildlife Service, and the Carpenter, S.R., Cole, J.J., Pace, M.L., Batt, R., Brock, W.A., Cline, T., Coloso, J.,
Hodgson, J.R., Kitchell, J.F., Seekell, D.A., Smith, L., Weidel, B., 2011. Early
Wildlife Management Institute. The views expressed in this
warnings of regime shifts: a whole-ecosystem experiment. Science 332,
manuscript are those of the authors and do not necessarily repre- 1079e1082.
sent the views or policies of the U.S. Environmental Protection Cumming, G.S., 2011a. Spatial resilience: integrating landscape ecology, resilience,
and sustainability. Landsc. Ecol. 26, 899e909.
Agency. Any use of trade, firm, or product names is for descriptive
Cumming, G.S., 2011b. Spatial Resilience in Social-ecological Systems. Springer,
purposes only and does not imply endorsement by the U.S. Dordrecht.
Government. Cumming, G.S., Barnes, G., Perz, S., Schmink, M., Sieving, K.E., Southworth, J.,
Binford, M., Holt, R.D., Stickler, C., Van Holt, T., 2005. An exploratory framework
for the empirical measurement of resilience. Ecosystems 8, 975e987.
References Curtin, P.D., Brush, G.S., Fisher, G.W., ebrary, I., 2001. Discovering the Chesapeake:
the History of an Ecosystem. Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, Md;
Adger, W.N., 2000. Social and ecological resilience: are they related? Prog. Hum. London.
Geogr. 24, 347e364. Cutter, S.L., Ash, K.D., Emrich, C.T., 2014. The geographies of community disaster
Adger, W.N., Eakin, H., Winkels, A., 2009. Nested and teleconnected vulnerabilities resilience. Global Environ. Change 29, 65e77.
to environmental change. Front. Ecol. Environ. 7, 150e157. Cutter, S.L., Barnes, L., Berry, M., Burton, C., Evans, E., Tate, E., Webb, J., 2008. A place-
Adger, W.N., Hughes, T.P., Folke, C., Carpenter, S.R., Rockstro €m, J., 2005. Social- based model for understanding community resilience to natural disasters.
ecological resilience to coastal disasters. Science 309, 1036e1039. Global Environ. Change 18, 598e606.
Akamani, K., 2012. A community resilience model for understanding and assessing Cutter, S.L., Burton, C.G., Emrich, C.T., 2010. Disaster resilience indicators for
the sustainability of forest-dependent communities. Hum. Ecol. Rev. 19, benchmarking baseline conditions. J. Homel. Secur. Emerg. Manage. 7, 1e22.
99e109. Cutter, S.L., Emrich, C.T., Mitchell, J.T., Boruff, B.J., Gall, M., Schmidtlein, M.C.,
Akamani, K., Hall, T.E., 2015. Determinants of the process and outcomes of house- Burton, C.G., Melton, G., 2006. The long road home: race, class, and recovery
hold participation in collaborative forest management in Ghana: a quantitative from Hurricane Katrina. Environ. Sci. Pol. Sustain. Dev. 48, 8e20.
test of a community resilience model. J. Environ. Manage. 147, 1e11. Dai, L., Vorselen, D., Korolev, K.S., Gore, J., 2012. Generic indicators for loss of
Allen, C., Angeler, D., Garmestani, A., Gunderson, L., Holling, C.S., 2014. Panarchy: resilience before a tipping point leading to population collapse. Science 336,
theory and application. Ecosystems 17, 578e589. 1175e1177.
Allen, C.R., Angeler, D.G., Cumming, G.S., Folke, C., Twidwell, D., Uden, D.R., 2016. Dakos, V., Bascompte, J., 2014. Critical slowing down as early warning for the onset
Quantifying spatial resilience. J. Appl. Ecol. 53, 625e635. of collapse in mutualistic communities. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. 111, 17546e17551.
Allen, C.R., Gunderson, L., Johnson, A.R., 2005. The use of discontinuities and Dakos, V., Carpenter, S.R., van Nes, E.H., Scheffer, M., 2015. Resilience indicators:
functional groups to assess relative resilience in complex systems. Ecosystems prospects and limitations for early warnings of regime shifts. Philos. Trans. Roy.
8, 958. Soc. Lond. B Biol. Sci. 370.
Allen, C.R., Holling, C., 2008. Discontinuities in Ecosystems and Other Complex Dakos, V., Scheffer, M., van Nes, E.H., Brovkin, V., Petoukhov, V., Held, H., 2008.
Systems. Columbia University Press. Slowing down as an early warning signal for abrupt climate change. Proc. Natl.
Allen, C.R., Holling, C.S., 2002. Cross-scale structure and scale breaks in ecosystems Acad. Sci. 105, 14308e14312.
and other complex systems. Ecosystems 5, 315e318. Dakos, V., van Nes, E.H., Scheffer, M., 2013. Flickering as an early warning signal.
An, L., 2012. Modeling human decisions in coupled human and natural systems: Theor. Ecol. 6, 309e317.
review of agent-based models. Ecol. Model. 229, 25e36. Donohue, I., Petchey, O.L., Montoya, J.M., Jackson, A.L., McNally, L., Viana, M.,
Andersen, T., Carstensen, J., Hern andez-García, E., Duarte, C.M., 2009. Ecological Healy, K., Lurgi, M., O'Connor, N.E., Emmerson, M.C., 2013. On the dimension-
thresholds and regime shifts: approaches to identification. Trends Ecol. Evol. 24, ality of ecological stability. Ecol. Lett. 16, 421e429.
49e57. Drake, J.M., Griffen, B.D., 2010. Early warning signals of extinction in deteriorating
Angeler, D.G., Allen, C.R., 2016. Quantifying resilience. J. Appl. Ecol. 53, 617e624. environments. Nature 467, 456e459.
Angeler, D.G., Allen, C.R., Barichievy, C., Eason, T., Garmestani, A.S., Graham, N.A.J., Eakin, H., Winkels, A., Sendzimir, J., 2009. Nested vulnerability: exploring cross-
Granholm, D., Gunderson, L.H., Knutson, M., Nash, K.L., Nelson, R.J., Nystro€m, M., scale linkages and vulnerability teleconnections in Mexican and Vietnamese
Spanbauer, T.L., Stow, C.A., Sundstrom, S.M., 2016. Management applications of coffee systems. Environ. Sci. Pol. 12, 398e412.
discontinuity theory. J. Appl. Ecol. 53, 688e698. Eason, T., Cabezas, H., 2012. Evaluating the sustainability of a regional system using
Angeler, D.G., Allen, C.R., Johnson, R.K., 2013. Measuring the relative resilience of Fisher information in the San Luis Basin, Colorado. J. Environ. Manage. 94,
subarctic lakes to global change: redundancies of functions within and across 41e49.
temporal scales. J. Appl. Ecol. 50, 572e584. Eason, T., Garmestani, A.S., Cabezas, H., 2014. Managing for resilience: early
Angeler, D.G., Allen, C.R., Uden, D.R., Johnson, R.K., 2015. Spatial patterns and detection of regime shifts in complex systems. Clean Technol. Environ. Policy
functional redundancies in a changing boreal lake landscape. Ecosystems 18, 16, 773e783.
889e902. Eason, T., Garmestani, A.S., Stow, C.A., Rojo, C., Alvarez-Cobelas, M., Cabezas, H.,
W.C. Chuang et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 213 (2018) 353e362 361
2016. Managing for resilience: an information theory-based approach to can be used for structuring problems and facilitating empirical research in
assessing ecosystems. J. Appl. Ecol. 53, 656e665. coastal systems. Environ. Sci. Pol. 56, 110e119.
Evans, T.P., Kelley, H., 2008. Assessing the transition from deforestation to forest Martin, R., Schlüter, M., 2015. Combining system dynamics and agent-based
regrowth with an agent-based model of land cover change for south-central modeling to analyze social-ecological interactions: an example from
Indiana (USA). Geoforum 39, 819e832. modeling restoration of a shallow lake. Front. Environ. Sci. 3, 66.
Fath, B.D., Cabezas, H., Pawlowski, C.W., 2003. Regime changes in ecological sys- Manyena, B., O'Brien, G., O'Keefe, P., Rose, J., 2011. Disaster resilience: a bounce back
tems: an information theory approach. J. Theor. Biol. 222, 517e530. or bounce forward ability? Local Environ. 16, 417.
Filatova, T., Polhill, J.G., van Ewijk, S., 2016. Regime shifts in coupled socio- Manyena, S.B., 2006. The concept of resilience revisited. Disasters 30, 433e450.
environmental systems: review of modelling challenges and approaches. En- Marcus, L., Colding, J., Kth, Arkitektur, Skolan fo €r arkitektur och, s, 2014. Toward an
viron. Model. Software 75, 333e347. integrated theory of spatial morphology and resilient urban systems. Ecol. Soc.
Folke, C., Carpenter, S., Walker, B., Scheffer, M., Elmqvist, T., Gunderson, L., 19, 55.
Holling, C.S., 2004. Regime shifts, resilience, andbiodiversity in ecosystem Mayer, A.L., Buma, B., Davis, A., Gagne , S.A., Loudermilk, E.L., Scheller, R.M.,
management. Annu. Rev. Ecol. Evol. Systemat. 35, 557e581. Schmiegelow, F.K.A., Wiersma, Y.F., Franklin, J., 2016. How landscape ecology
Frazier, T.G., Thompson, C.M., Dezzani, R.J., Butsick, D., 2013. Spatial and temporal informs global land-change science and policy. BioScience 66, 458e469.
quantification of resilience at the community scale. Appl. Geogr. 42, 95e107. McAllister, R.R.J., Gross, J.E., Stokes, C.J., 2006. Rangeland Consolidation Patterns in
Gallopín, G.C., 2006. Linkages between vulnerability, resilience, and adaptive ca- Australia: an Agent-based Modelling Approach, pp. 301e318.
pacity. Global Environ. Change 16, 293e303. McRae, B.H., Hall, S.A., Beier, P., Theobald, D.M., 2012. Where to restore ecological
Garmestani, A.S., Allen, C.R., Bessey, K.M., 2005. Time-series analysis of clusters in connectivity? Detecting barriers and quantifying restoration benefits. PLoS ONE
city size distributions. Urban Stud. 42, 1507e1515. 7, e52604.
Garmestani, A.S., Allen, C.R., Gallagher, C.M., 2008. Power laws, discontinuities and Nash, K.L., Allen, C.R., Angeler, D.G., Barichievy, C., Eason, T., Garmestani, A.S.,
regional city size distributions. J. Econ. Behav. Organ. 68, 209e216. Graham, N.A.J., Granholm, D., Knutson, M., Nelson, R.J., Nystro €m, M., Stow, C.A.,
Garmestani, A.S., Allen, C.R., Gallagher, C.M., Mittelstaedt, J.D., 2007. Departures Sundstrom, S.M., 2014. Discontinuities, cross-scale patterns, and the organiza-
from Gibrat's law, discontinuities and city size distributions. Urban Stud. 44, tion of ecosystems. Ecology 95, 654e667.
1997e2007. Nash, K.L., Graham, N.A.J., Wilson, S.K., Bellwood, D.R., 2013. Cross-scale habitat
Garmestani, A.S., Allen, C.R., Gunderson, L., 2009. Panarchy: discontinuities reveal structure drives fish body size distributions on coral reefs. Ecosystems 16,
similarities in the dynamic system structure of ecological and social systems. 478e490.
Ecol. Soc. 14, 15. Norris, F.H., Stevens, S.P., Pfefferbaum, B., Wyche, K.F., Pfefferbaum, R.L., 2008.
Garmestani, A.S., Allen, C.R., Mittelstaedt, J.D., Stow, C.A., Ward, W.A., 2006. Firm Community resilience as a metaphor, theory, set of capacities, and strategy for
size diversity, functional richness, and resilience. Environ. Dev. Econ. 11, disaster readiness. Am. J. Community Psychol. 41, 127e150.
533e551. Nystro€m, M., Folke, C., 2001. Spatial resilience of coral reefs. Ecosystems 4, 406e417.
Gonzalez Mejia, A.M., Eason, T.N., Cabezas, H., Suidan, M., 2014. Social and economic Perz, S.G., Cabrera, L., Carvalho, L.A., Castillo, J., Chacacanta, R., Cossio, R.E.,
sustainability of urban systems: comparative analysis of metropolitan statistical Solano, Y.F., Hoelle, J., Perales, L.M., Puerta, I., Rojas Ce spedes, D., Rojas
areas in Ohio, USA. Sustain. Sci. 9 (2), 217e228. Camacho, I., Costa Silva, A., 2012. Regional integration and local change: road
Go€ the, E., Sandin, L., Allen, C.R., Angeler, D.G., 2014. Quantifying spatial scaling paving, community connectivity, and socialeecological resilience in a tri-
patterns and their local and regional correlates in headwater streams: impli- national frontier, southwestern Amazonia. Reg. Environ. Change 12, 35e53.
cations for resilience. Ecol. Soc. 19. Peterson, G., Allen, C.R., Holling, C.S., 1998. Ecological resilience, biodiversity, and
Green, O.O., Garmestani, A.S., Allen, C.R., Gunderson, L.H., Ruhl, J.B., Arnold, C.A., scale. Ecosystems 1, 6e18.
Graham, N.A.J., Cosens, B., Angeler, D.G., Chaffin, B.C., Holling, C.S., 2015. Barriers Raffaelli, D., Hardiman, A., Smart, J., Yamanaka, T., White, P.C.L., 2016. The textural
and bridges to the integration of social-ecological resilience and law. Front. Ecol. discontinuity hypothesis: an exploration at a regional level. Shortened version:
Environ. 13, 332e337. exploring Holling's TDH. Oikos 125, 797e803.
Gunderson, L., 2010. Ecological and human community resilience in response to Scheffer, M., Bascompte, J., Brock, W.A., Brovkin, V., Carpenter, S.R., Dakos, V.,
natural disasters. Ecol. Soc. 15, 18. Held, H., van Nes, E.H., Rietkerk, M., Sugihara, G., 2009. Early-warning signals
Gunderson, L.H., 2000. Ecological resilienceein theory and application. Annu. Rev. for critical transitions. Nature 461, 53e59.
Ecol. Systemat. 31, 425e439. Scheffer, M., Carpenter, S.R., Dakos, V., Nes, E.V., 2015. Generic indicators of
Gunderson, L.H., Pritchard, L., 2002. Resilience and the Behavior of Large-scale ecological resilience: inferring the chance of a critical transition. Annu. Rev.
Systems. Island Press, Washington, DC. Ecol. Evol. Syst. 46.
Hare, M., Deadman, P., 2004. Further towards a taxonomy of agent-based simulation Seekell, D.A., Carpenter, S.R., Pace, M.L., 2011. Conditional heteroscedasticity as a
models in environmental management. Math. Comput. Simulat. 64, 25e40. leading indicator of ecological regime shifts. Am. Nat. 178, 442e451.
Hastings, A., Wysham, D.B., 2010. Regime shifts in ecological systems can occur with Seekell, D.A., Carpenter, S.R., Cline, T.J., Pace, M.L., 2012. Conditional hetero-
no warning. Ecol. Lett. 13, 464e472. skedasticity forecasts regime shift in a whole-ecosystem experiment. Ecosys-
Hicks, C.C., Crowder, L.B., Graham, N.A.J., Kittinger, J.N., Cornu, E.L., 2016. Social tems 15, 741e747.
drivers forewarn of marine regime shifts. Front. Ecol. Environ. 14, 252e260. Sendzimir, J., Magnuszewski, P., Flachner, Z., Balogh, P., Molnar, G., Sarvari, A.,
Holling, C.S., 1973. Resilience and stability of ecological systems. Annu. Rev. Ecol. Nagy, Z., 2008. Assessing the resilience of a river management regime: informal
Systemat. 4, 1e23. learning in a shadow network in the Tisza river basin. Ecol. Soc. 13, 13.
Holling, C.S., 1992. Cross-scale morphology, geometry, and dynamics of ecosystems. Sendzimir, J., Reij, C.P., Magnuszewski, P., 2011. Rebuilding resilience in the sahel:
Ecol. Monogr. 62, 447e502. regreening in the maradi and zinder regions of Niger. Ecol. Soc. 16, 1.
Holling, C.S., 1996. Engineering resilience versus ecological resilience. Eng. Ecol. Soliveres, S., Fons van der, P., Manning, P., Prati, D., Gossner, M.M., Renner, S.C.,
Constraints 31e44. Alt, F., Arndt, H., Baumgartner, V., Binkenstein, J., Birkhofer, K., Blaser, S.,
Holling, C.S., Goldberg, M.A., 1971. Ecology and planning. J. Am. Inst. Plan. 37, Blüthgen, N., Boch, S., Bo € hm, S., Bo€ rschig, C., Buscot, F., Dieko€tter, T., Heinze, J.,
221e230. Ho€lzel, N., Jung, K., Klaus, V.H., Kleinebecker, T., Klemmer, S., Krauss, J.,
Janssen, M.A., 2001. An exploratory integrated model to assess management of lake Lange, M., Morris, E.K., Müller, J., Oelmann, Y., Overmann, J., Pasalic, E.,
eutrophication. Ecol. Model. 140, 111e124. Rillig, M.C., Schaefer, H.M., Schloter, M., Schmitt, B., Scho €ning, I., Schrumpf, M.,
Jopp, F., Breckling, B., Reuter, H., 2011. Modelling Complex Ecological Dynamics: an Sikorski, J., Socher, S.A., Solly, E.F., Sonnemann, I., Sorkau, E., Steckel, J., Steffan-
Introduction into Ecological Modelling for Students, Teachers & Scientists. Dewenter, I., Stempfhuber, B., Tschapka, M., Türke, M., Venter, P.C., Weiner, C.N.,
Springer, New York: Heidelberg. Weisser, W.W., Werner, M., Westphal, C., Wilcke, W., Wolters, V., Wubet, T.,
Karunanithi, A.T., Garmestani, A.S., Eason, T., Cabezas, H., 2011. The characterization Wurst, S., Fischer, M., Allan, E., 2016. Biodiversity at multiple trophic levels is
of socio-political instability, development and sustainability with Fisher infor- needed for ecosystem multifunctionality. Nature 536, 456e459.
mation. Glob. Environ. Chang. 21, 77e84. Spanbauer, T.L., Allen, C.R., Angeler, D.G., Eason, T., Fritz, S.C., Garmestani, A.S.,
Kelly, C., Ferrara, A., Wilson, G.A., Ripullone, F., Nole, A., Harmer, N., Salvati, L., 2015. Nash, K.L., Stone, J.R., 2014. Prolonged instability prior to a regime Shift. PLoS
Community resilience and land degradation in forest and shrubland socio- ONE 9, e108936.
ecological systems: evidence from Gorgoglione, Basilicata, Italy. Land Use Pol. Spanbauer, T.L., Allen, C.R., Angeler, D.G., Eason, T., Fritz, S.C., Garmestani, A.S.,
46, 11e20. Nash, K.L., Stone, J.R., Stow, C.A., Sundstrom, S.M., 2016. Body size distributions
Kemp, W.M., Boynton, W.R., Adolf, J.E., Boesch, D.F., Boicourt, W.C., Brush, G., signal a regime shift in a lake ecosystem. Proceed. Roy. Soc. B Biol. Sci. 283.
Cornwell, J.C., Fisher, T.R., Glibert, P.M., Hagy, J.D., Harding, L.W., Houde, E.D., Spears, B.M., Carvalho, L., Futter, M.N., May, L., Thackeray, S.J., Adrian, R.,
Kimmel, D.G., Miller, W.D., Newell, R.I.E., Roman, M.R., Smith, E.M., Angeler, D.G., Burthe, S.J., Davidson, T.A., Daunt, F., Gsell, A.S., Hessen, D.O.,
Stevenson, J.C., 2005. Eutrophication of Chesapeake Bay: historical trends and Moorhouse, H., Huser, B., Ives, S.C., Janssen, A.B.G., Mackay, E.B.,
ecological interactions. Mar. Ecol. Prog. Ser. 303, 1e29. Søndergaard, M., Jeppesen, E., 2016. Ecological instability in lakes: a predictable
Klein, R.J.T., Nicholls, R.J., Thomalla, F., 2003a. Resilience to natural hazards: how condition? Environ. Sci. Technol. 50, 3285e3286.
useful is this concept? Global Environ. Change Part B Environ. Hazards 5, Spielmann, K.A., Peeples, M.A., Glowacki, D.M., Dugmore, A., 2016. Early warning
35e45. signals of social transformation: a case study from the US Southwest. PLoS ONE
Klein, R.J.T., Nicholls, R.J., Thomalla, F., 2003b. The resilience of coastal megacities to 11, e0163685.
weather-related hazards. In: Kreimer, A., Arnold, M., Carlin, A. (Eds.), Building Stirnemann, I.A., Ikin, K., Gibbons, P., Blanchard, W., Lindenmayer, D.B., 2015.
Safer Cities: the Future of Disaster Risk. World Bank, Washington, D.C. Measuring habitat heterogeneity reveals new insights into bird community
Lewison, R.L., Rudd, M.A., Al-Hayek, W., Baldwin, C., Beger, M., Lieske, S.N., Jones, C., composition. Oecologia 177, 733e746.
Satumanatpan, S., Junchompoo, C., Hines, E., 2016. How the DPSIR framework Sundstrom, S.M., Allen, C.R., Barichievy, C., 2012. Species, functional groups, and
362 W.C. Chuang et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 213 (2018) 353e362
thresholds in ecological resilience. Conserv. Biol. 26, 305e314. catastrophic shifts in complex systems: assessing changing conditions in nation
Sundstrom, S.M., Angeler, D.G., Garmestani, A.S., García, J.H., Allen, C.R., Sveriges, states. Heliyon 3 (12), e00465.
2014. Transdisciplinary application of cross-scale resilience. Sustainability 6, Vogel, C., Moser, S.C., Kasperson, R.E., Dabelko, G.D., 2007. Linking vulnerability,
6925e6948. adaptation, and resilience science to practice: pathways, players, and partner-
Sundstrom, S.M., Eason, T., Nelson, R.J., Angeler, D.G., Barichievy, C., ships. Global Environ. Change 17, 349e364.
Garmestani, A.S., Graham, N.A.J., Granholm, D., Gunderson, L., Knutson, M., Walker, B., Holling, C.S., Carpenter, S.R., Kinzig, A., 2004. Resilience, adaptability and
Nash, K.L., Spanbauer, T., Stow, C.A., Allen, C.R., 2017. Detecting spatial regimes transformability in social-ecological systems. Ecol. Soc. 9, 5.
in ecosystems. Ecol. Lett. 20, 19e32. Wardwell, D.A., Allen, C.R., Peterson, G.D., Tyre, A.J., 2008. A test of the cross-scale
Thibault, K.M., White, E.P., Hurlbert, A.H., Ernest, S.K.M., 2011. Multimodality in the resilience model: functional richness in Mediterranean-climate ecosystems.
individual size distributions of bird communities. Global Ecol. Biogeogr. 20, Ecol. Complex. 5, 165e182.
145e153. Wiens, J.A., 1989. Spatial scaling in ecology. Funct. Ecol. 3, 385e397.
Timmerman, P., 1981. Vulnerability, Resilience and the Collapse of Society. Institute Zurlini, G., Jones, K.B., Riitters, K.H., Li, B.-L., Petrosillo, I., 2014. Early warning signals
for Environmental Studies, University of Toronto, Canada. of regime shifts from cross-scale connectivity of land-cover patterns. Ecol.
Vance, L., Eason, T., Cabezas, H., Gorman, M.E., 2017. Toward a leading indicator of Indicat. 45, 549.