Publications

Per Olsson, Michele-Lee Moore. 2024. A resilience-based transformations approach to peacebuilding and transformative justice. Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cosust.2023.101392

Moving from a state of war or violent conflict will require a transformation, but there are no guarantees that transformations automatically lead to peace, sustainability, and justice. This review focuses on the temporary phase when a system is in limbo between the existing, dominant state and a new alternative state. We combine insights from a resilience approach to transformations with peacebuilding and transformative justic...

Olsson, P., C. Folke, and M.-L. Moore. 2022. Capacities for navigating large-scale sustaina­bility transformations: Exploring the revolt and remembrance mechanisms for shaping collapse and renewal in social-ecological systems. In: Gunderson, L., C.R Allen and A. Garmestani (eds.) . Applied Panarchy: Applications and Diffu­sion across Disciplines. Island Press, Washington DC, USA. Pp. 155-180

Lam, D., Jiménez-Aceituno, A., Guerrero Lara, L., Sellberg, M., Norström, A., Moore, M., Peterson, G., Olsson, P. 2022. Amplifying actions for food system transformation: insights from the Stockholm region. Sustainability Science. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11625-022-01154-7

Food is essential to people and is one of the main ways in which people are connected to the world’s ecosystems. However, food systems often cause ecosystem degradation and produce ill-health, which has generated increasing calls to transform food systems to be more sustainable. The Swedish food system is currently undergoing substantial change. A varied set of local actors have created alternative sustainability initiatives t...

Reyers, B., Moore, M., Haider, L., Schlüter, M. 2022. The contributions of resilience to reshaping sustainable development. Nature Sustainability. http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41893-022-00889-6

We review the past decade’s widespread application of resilience science in sustainable development practice and examine whether and how resilience is reshaping this practice to better engage in complex contexts. We analyse six shifts in practice: from capitals to capacities, from objects to relations, from outcomes to processes, from closed to open systems, from generic interventions to context sensitivity, and from linear to...

Ahlström, H., Hileman, J., Wang-Erlandsson, L., García, M., Moore, M., Jonas, K., Pranindita, A., Kuiper, J., Fetzer, I., Jaramillo, F., Svedin, U.. 2021. An Earth system law perspective on governing social-hydrological systems in the Anthropocene. Earth System Governance. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.esg.2021.100120

The global hydrological cycle is characterized by complex interdependencies and self-regulating feedbacks that keep water in an ever-evolving state of flux at local, regional, and global levels. Increasingly, the scale of human impacts in the Anthropocene is altering the dynamics of this cycle, which presents additional challenges for water governance. “Earth system law” provides an important approach for addressing gaps in go...

Baird J., Quinlan A., Plummer R., Moore ML., Krievins K. 2021. Capacities for Watershed Resilience: Persistence, Adaptation, and Transformation. In: Baird J., Plummer R. (eds) Water Resilience. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-48110-0_7

Water management and governance at the watershed scale is complex, with attention needed to the realities of fit with institutional arrangements and consideration of the dynamic and uncertain nature of social-ecological systems. The concept of social-ecological resilience and its application to water resources – ‘water resilience’ hereafter – offers a framework by which to approach these critical considerations. Water resilien...

Baltutis, W.J. and Moore, M.L., 2020. Whose Border? Contested Geographies and Columbia River Treaty Modernization. Journal of Borderlands Studies, 35(4), pp.581-601.

This paper explores the links between contemporary bordering processes, Indigenous nations traditional territories, and transboundary water governance processes, using the case of the Columbia River Treaty (CRT) modernization process. We posit the Columbia River is shared not just by two nations, but also by multiple Indigenous nations with various inter-nation borders. To-date, the implications of this in practice do not appe...

Pereira, L., N. Frantzeskaki, A. Hebinck, L. Charli, J. Scott, M. Dyer, H. Eakin, et.al. 2019. Transformative spaces in the making: key lessons from nine cases in the Global South. Sustainability Science:1–18.

Creating a just and sustainable planet will require not only small changes, but also systemic transformations in how humans relate to the planet and to each other, i.e., social–ecological transformations. We suggest there is a need for collaborative environments where experimentation with new configurations of social–ecological systems can occur, and we refer to these as transformative spaces. In this paper, we seek a better ...

Baltutis, W. J., and M.-L. Moore. 2019. Degrees of change toward polycentric transboundary water governance: exploring the Columbia River and the Lesotho Highlands Water Project. Ecology and Society 24(2):6.https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-10852-240206

 Complex challenges emerging in transboundary river basins reveal a need to include a range of interests and actors in governance processes. Polycentric governance is one framework that can address this need and inform adaptive and resilient governance processes in transboundary basins as linked social and ecological systems. Here, we explore whether and how nonstate actors might be contributing to a shift in governance toward...

Reyers, B., Folke, C., Moore, M-L., R. Biggs, Galaz. V. 2018. Social-Ecological Systems Insights for Navigating the Dynamics of the Anthropocene. Annu. Rev. Environ. Resour. 2018. 43:267–89. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-environ-110615-085349

Social-ecological systems (SES) research offers new theory and evidence to transform sustainable development to better contend with the challenges of the Anthropocene. Four insights from contemporary SES literature on (a) intertwined SES, (b) cross-scale dynamics, (c) systemic tipping points, and (d) transformational change are explored. Based on these insights, shifts in sustainable development practice are suggested to recog...