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seclement's review against another edition
3.0
Really good basic overview, though I personally think this is more useful for the practitioner than the academic. It was an easy and enjoyable read, but from the perspective of someone looking to apply resilience thinking in a rigorous research programme, I think the book is of limited use. The resilience literature is still really light in the area of social systems, which is evident particularly in the approach presented for scenario planning. I understand that there are different schools of thought about how scenario planning exercises should be done, and I realise that Walker and Salt approach them as something that builds resilience in the community, without necessarily caring about the likelihood of the scenarios. However, I think ending up with something like a "Refugee Revolution" scenario for the Northern Highlands Lake District is limited in its usefulness, and I question the notion that scenario planning contributes very much to building resilience in social systems. I also would have liked a more thorough discussion of when resilience is negative - not just in ecological systems but in social systems. The latter in particular only received cursory attention. With all that said, this is a great introductory book, written in an approachable and engaging style, which is exactly what the authors intended.
60degreesn's review against another edition
4.0
Excellent concise introduction to resilience thinking.
natcatsbookishcafe's review against another edition
This book was read for my college course: Sustainability, Resilience, And Society. I will not be rating it. It was informative, if not a bit repetitive at times, but I suppose that really ingrains in you what you should be learning from the book.
mburnamfink's review against another edition
4.0
Resilience Thinking is a slim book about sustainability and systems in ecology. Structured around five case studies, this volume is both a manifesto and a strong work of popular scholarship. Brian Walker clearly elucidates the failures of command-and-control ecosystem management based on optimizing one part of a system for efficiency. As the case studies in ecosystem management show, human prosperity is based around ecosystem services. Over decades and centuries, human intervention in these systems has disrupted natural cycles, the accumulated damage pushing these systems across a threshold where lakes become stinking stagnant ponds, coral reefs bleached deserts, and forests highly flammable pest traps.
The antidote to fragility and collapse is diversity of response, pluralistic management systems, and recognizing slow changes in key variables, like ground-water salinity. Systems with many species and redundancies perform better under pressure. Long term build up of phosphorus in water, or carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, cannot be easily reversed once a tipping point has been crossed.
There's an element of tragedy to this book. With over a decade since its publication, I can't bear to go and check on how the cases have performed. The logical of capitalism, of maximizing immediate profits and protecting voter interest groups, seems too strong to easily overcome. And as a card-carrying ecomodernist, I wonder how resilience fits in with a program of intensification and decoupling. Still, this is an important book and one that deserves careful attention.
The antidote to fragility and collapse is diversity of response, pluralistic management systems, and recognizing slow changes in key variables, like ground-water salinity. Systems with many species and redundancies perform better under pressure. Long term build up of phosphorus in water, or carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, cannot be easily reversed once a tipping point has been crossed.
There's an element of tragedy to this book. With over a decade since its publication, I can't bear to go and check on how the cases have performed. The logical of capitalism, of maximizing immediate profits and protecting voter interest groups, seems too strong to easily overcome. And as a card-carrying ecomodernist, I wonder how resilience fits in with a program of intensification and decoupling. Still, this is an important book and one that deserves careful attention.
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