1 Ecologies and networks of resilience

Failing ecological systems – increased wildfire risk

Ideas about resilient ecological networks were highlighted by the Making Space for Nature report (Lawton et al., 2010) which demonstrated the widely accepted mantra that wildlife sites had to be ‘better, bigger, more and joined’ if ecological networks were to be resilient in the face of continuing environmental change and human pressures. ‘Resilience ecology’ was defined in this report as not being at risk of extinction and being capable of sustaining wildlife populations into the future. In 2010, it is possible that the full nature of the risk of extinction to non-humans had not been made clear along with the urgent nature of establishing ‘better, bigger, more and joined’ networks to provide habitats capable of sustaining life in an ever-heating world. The 2023 wildfires across North America, Europe and Hawaii along with flooding in parts of Asia have shown that humans are now at severe risk from failing ecological systems.

Building the needful resilient ecological networks to make a difference requires the skills developed by people who have understood the sustainability principles of compassion, partnership, participation, transdisciplinarity and the contribution of traditional ways of thinking. Only then will networks be built and the individualistic thinking that has put the world at risk become outmoded.

Working on agroecosystems in South America

To secure the kinds of resilient ecological networks that can sustain our world, we can be inspired by the work of Fred Windsor (2020) on resilient agroecosystems in South America and the USA National Ecological Observatory Network (Robinson et al., 2022). Researchers Fougeres and Ruiz Reyes (2018) are leading a group looking at Social-Ecological Resilience and Transformation, identifying the necessary conditions for resilient networks. They identified that resilient systems need:

• Resilience: to be able to absorb disturbance and shocks and still retain essentially the same structure, function and identity.
• Adaptability: the capacity of actors in a system to learn and adjust their responses to changing external drivers and internal processes.
• Transformability: the capacity to alter trajectory and cross into a new course when ecological, economic, or social structures make the existing direction unsustainable.

Re-imagining networks and organisations as non-hierarchical, inter-relational, and evolving, can enable such networks to chart a course towards a more adaptable, transformable, resilient, and just future. Such networks can be imagined by learners who have themselves learned through being part of partnerships, know the strength that comes through participation, and have learned through compassionate pedagogies.