1. Ecological Literacy & Systems Thinking

2. Why learn about global environmental problems?
Instrumental purpose
Enriches life, contributes to meaning
Empowerment
Is knowledge power?
Citizenship
POL S 384 Lecture 2

3. Connective learning as empowerment
Is knowledge power?
Information overload
From information to knowledge to wisdom
Ecology: the science of living systems
Relational thinking
Sustainability
Meeting today’s needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet theirs
A new opening in university education
Interdisciplinary and integrative teaching & learning
Hands-on learning
Multicultural learning
POL S 384 Lecture 2

4. For a critique, see http://www. danielwillingham

5. How to teach and learn for sustainability?
Living within an ecosystem’s carrying capacity
“Triple bottom line” & beyond
Top-down vs. bottom-up approaches
Ecological literacy
Need social knowledge, not just facts and numbers
Must be experiential -- go outside!
Seeking connections
Care -- we act upon that which we care about
Ecology: the science of living systems
POL S 384 Lecture 2

6. Thinking in Systems
“A system is an interconnected set of elements that is coherently organized in a way that achieves something (function or purpose).”
Examples?
Ecological footprint
POL S 384 Lecture 2

7. Basics of Living Systems Theory
Holism: the whole is greater than sum of parts
Emergent properties
Evolutionary: adaptive & self-generative
Composed of symbiotic networks
Interdependence & feedback
Balancing vs. reinforcing feedback
Virtuous cycles: flows of information, energy & matter
Surprise & nonlinearity are inevitable.
Nested hierarchies
Partially decomposable
Developmental change: transcend and include
POL S 384 Lecture 2

8. POL S 384 Lecture 2

9. POL S 384 Lecture 2

10. Earth Systems Science
POL S 384 Lecture 2

11. Systems thinking means updating the noosphere!
We pay too little attention to history and are too fascinated by the events they generate. (pp.90)
We are not too skilled in understanding the nature of relationships (pp.91) as the world is full of nonlinearities.
We our attached to our mental categories. (pp.98)
We lean towards monocausal explanations.
We don’t recognize which factor is limiting. Growth depletes or enhances limits and therefore changes what is limiting. (pp. 102)
We rarely see the full range of possibilities before us (pp. 106). We are subject to bounded rationality i.e. we make reasonable decisions based on the information we have.
(Slide 31 from Sandhya Johnson’s Slideshare summary)
POL S 384 Lecture 2

12. Resilience Thinking
A system’s capacity to withstand disturbance while retaining its basic structure & function
Change is inevitable
Complex systems undergo adaptive cycles
From simple, low energy to complex, high energy to decline & reorganization or collapse
Resilience and/or sustainability
Sustainability  stability
Human systems embedded in ecosystems
… and vice versa
Independence and interdependence
POL S 384 Lecture 2

13. Where is the global economy on the adaptive cycle?
POL S 384 Lecture 2

14. Sustainability What needs to be sustained?
What is the purpose of the global economy?
Why is purpose important in human systems?
POL S 384 Lecture 2

15. "In wildness is preservation of the world.“ ~Thoreau
What did he mean?
“Wildness,” not wilderness
How might this apply to resilience thinking?
… education?
POL S 384 Lecture 2