2015-03-18
March 18 was the twenty-fourth meeting for Systems Thinking Ontario. The registration was on Eventbrite.
Theme: Systems and Resilience Redux: Deciphering Panarchy (Some More)
The content from February was so rich, that everyone didn't have an opportunity to voice their ideas and questions. For March, we'll continue the discussion as a group sense-making activity.
Panachy is a theory of adaptive change that is cross-scale and dynamic. Amongst systems thinkers, the 2002 book Panarchy: Understanding Transformations in Human and Natural Systems by Lance H. Gunderson andC. S. Holling is well known as a classic work. However, many readers of the text have found the concepts and diagrams difficult to grasp.
The short 90-minute duration of our sessions will favour individuals who have done the pre-reading.
Venue:
Required pre-reading:
We will again be discussing this comprehensive article:
C. S. Holling, C. S. 2001. “Understanding the Complexity of Economic, Ecological, and Social Systems.” Ecosystems 4 (5): 390–405. doi:10.1007/s10021-001-0101-5, cited at http://scholar.google.com/scholar?cluster=1326346503885901396.
Additionally, here's a video that introduces the idea of resilience without the adaptive loop in 3D:
Our featured reviewer from February, Marta Berbés-Blázquez, suggested some additional resources:
Here is the link for the Resilience Assessment Workbook: http://www.resalliance.org/index.php/resilience_assessment
The Resilience Alliance website offers a lot of materials (http://www.resalliance.org/), including a link to Garry Peterson’s blog (http://rs.resalliance.org/).
The Stockholm Resilience Centre also does a lot of dissemination: http://www.stockholmresilience.org/ I particularly like their white board seminars: http://www.stockholmresilience.org/21/news--events/latest-videos/whiteboard-seminars.html
Finally, there are a couple of books that might be nice to read along with Panarchy:
Frances Westley’s "Getting to Maybe" http://www.randomhouse.com/book/189202/getting-to-maybe-by-frances-westley-brenda-zimmerman-and-michael-patton Brian Walker’s “Resilience Thinking” http://islandpress.org/resilience-thinking and “Resilience Practice” http://islandpress.org/resilience-practice
Agenda
Post-meeting artifacts
Systems Thinking Ontario March 2015: Session on Systems and Resilience Redux: Deciphering Panarchy (Some More) extended discussion from last month. Some attendees had not pre-read article, so interpreting figures without visual aids was like described video on television. Returning attendees thought that extra time spent on the same theme helped unwrap the mystery, and the month in between gave time for consideration. (Systems Thinking Ontario, OCAD U. Lambert Lounge) 20150318