Complexity and Resilience

Victor Galaz
Stockholm Resilience Centre
Stockholm University
 How should we
govern ourselves in
an era of rapid global
change?
Resilience

capacity to deal with change,

stress and shocks, and
continue to develop
 Adaptation
”Bounce back”
Innovation
Transformation
Individual
Private company
International organization
Local community
Thresholds and “Tipping Points”
Cascades
• Land use change (deforestation, urban sprawl)
• Rapid urbanization
• Infrastructural development
(irrigation systems, creation of new urban ”habitats”)
• Eroded health infrastructure in the 1980s and 1990s
• ”Quick fix” solutions create more resistant vectors
• Climatic factors (El Nino Oscillation trigger larger
outbreaks)
 Dengue epidemic in Brazil, 2007-2008

1. Fast evolving surprise with the ability to create a

crisis that cascades across system boundaries,
and spatial scales
2. Complex and multilevel underlying drivers
3. Recombination potential with additional
stresses, such as poverty, eroded health
infrastructure, creates the possibility of an
escalation of the crisis.
A New Generation of Ecological Crises?
Global changes in the political
landscape
•Decentralization

”One of the most important global policy experiments”

”Decentralization can lead to more efficient governance,

better link to local context” -> higher capacity to deal with
complex problems

Forest co-management, water management, ecosystem

management, development projects, etc.
Public-Private Partnerships

Formalized collaboration between state actors and private/

non-state actors

Expectation: more flexible and efficient way to reach

political aims.

Not privatization – not state controlled

Water, health, biodiversity conservation, etc.

Non-Governmental Organizations

Increased number and participation of

NGOs, ”think-tanks”, epistemic communities
at all political levels.

Biodiversity, climate policy, fisheries policy,

m.m.
International agreements

•Increased influence of multilateral

agreements on national policy

e.g. Kyoto-protocol, EU:s Framework

Directives, Convention on Biological
Diversity, World Trade Organization, etc

1960: 20 , 1990: 140, 2005: more than 700

Centralized decision-making

Central policy-maker (e.g. environmental Decision-making

ministry)

Implementation and monitoring

Regional or local state authorities

Local natural resource users Behavioral response

Decision-making in complex
governance systems
International norms, agreements

Central policy-maker (e.g. environmental ministry) Decision-making,

implementation,
negotiations,
Non-state actors partnerships

Regional or local state authorities Implementation, monitoring,

negotiations, partnerships

Decentralization

Local natural resource users

Global Environmental Change
+ Global Political Change
Are they compatible?
 ”Good Governance” according to
the World Bank:
Voice and Accountability, Political Stability and
Absence of Violence/Terrorism, Government
Effectiveness, Regulatory Quality, Rule of Law,
and Control of Corruption.
 Does ”good governance”
lead to better protection of
ecosystems?
Voice and Accountability, Political
Stability and Absence of Violence/
Terrorism, Government Effectiveness,
Regulatory Quality, Rule of Law, and
Control of Corruption.
Forest Cover Change
 Biodiversity (bird population)

High levels of corruption Low levels of corruption

?
Diversity

Enhances our capacity to deal with with

uncertainty and change.
Elinor Ostrom: no ”blue-prints” for
ecosystem management.
Folke: helps us recover and innovate.

”Portfolio of options to deal with change”.

Centralization vs
decentralization
Decentralized
Centralized systems systems
+ have overview, track long term
changes,+ possibility
compensate to innovate in the
for maladaptive
face of surprises, early warning,
lower units
and
- too far prompt
away response
to detect early warnings,
- can beInformation
and innovate. overwelmed by
congestion.
disturbance, fail to coordinate
with other ”small” units
Möbius strip
Too Good to
be True?
“High Reliability
Organizations” -
organizations with
the capacity to
cope with both
incremental
change and
catastrophic
surprises.
 Capacity to collect and analyze very large
amounts of information, detect early
warning signals, and facilitate fast
coordination of large number of actors.

Decision-making dependent on the

type of change in environment.

High capacity for learning after crises, strong

incentives to report and take initiatives to
repair mistakes and cope with surprises.
Possible for large-scale
organizations? Severe
global change
challenges? How?
Where?