A Review of Social–Ecological System Research and Geographical Applications

Abstract

This paper reviews the exploration and application of social–ecological systems research perspectives to sustainable development issues such as the areas of coupled human–earth relations, resource management, geographical landscape patterns, system dynamics, and the relationship between ecosystem services and human well-being, and summarizes practical approaches and applied techniques for solving social–ecological system problems in order to understand changes and relationships in complex systems better. The article summarizes the theoretical research on social–ecological systems by domestic and international scholars into six frameworks: system resilience, system cascade, nature’s contribution to humans based on ecosystem services, public resource system management, system behavior scenario analysis, and system regime shift. Innovative research and practice oriented to complexity, coupling, and nonlinearity have emerged. However, there are differences between scientific research and applied practice, including their theoretical and methodological orientations. We should be oriented to social–ecological system problems to achieve a transformation from components to relationships, from outcomes to processes, from single to open systems, from general interventions to context sensitivity, and from linear to complex causality to meet what is required from sustainability science and geography.