The Garden Route Interface meeting is an annual event taking place in the Garden Route, providing a forum for researchers and practitioners interested in better understanding and managing (or navigating) SES and their complex interactions and feedbacks. The 2017 meeting attracted 75 delegates and important discussion themes included the establishment of long-term social-ecological research sites, methods for and challenges in studying SES, sustainable resource use, adaptations and transformations in SES, ecosystem services and benefit flows, ways in which people connect with nature, and advice for bridging science-management divides. This year the meeting will be held at Pine Lake Marina, Sedgefield, South [...]

The ARS Africae project (https://www.ars-africae.org/) is running an interdisciplinary workshop on ecological modelling at Wits Rural Facility (near Hoedspruit) from the 27th Feb to the 2nd March 2018. This workshop will introduce multi-agent modeling as an approach for dealing with complex SES; as well as vegetation modeling. This workshop should appeal to participants interested in ecological modelling, as well as stakeholders involved in management. If you are interested, contact Karen Bradshaw (k.bradshaw@ru.ac.za), stating your area of interest and any specific topics for discussion. Funding is also available, for more information please consult the attachment below. Call for Participation 2018

The SARChI Chair in Transformative Social Learning and Green Skills Learning Pathways at Rhodes University, located in the Environmental Learning Research Centre in the Faculty of Education in Grahamstown, South Africa (see www.ru.ac.za/elrc), has two full time Masters in Education scholarships available for motivated, high achieving scholars with an interest in the above areas. The researchers will be required to undertake inter-disciplinary research, with emphasis on social learning in a food and water security management context. The researchers will be required to undertake rigorous, theoretically strong qualitative research focusing on the capacity building and social learning of key actors within [...]

Escalating global challenges such as climate change,  food and water security, biodiversity loss, socio‐political conflict and economic volatility, demand new approaches to researching and governing our environment and  societies.  Approaches  that  account  for  the  complex  relationships  between  human  well‐being  and ecological  sustainability,  while  dealing  with  ongoing  change  and  uncertainty,  have  become  critical.  It  is  increasingly  apparent that fundamental reorganization of our societies is necessary to achieve a just society for all, while maintaining  the environmental conditions that underlie  human prosperity. Navigating such a  transformation  will  require a capacity  to deal with changes  that are  fundamentally unknown and unpredictable  ‐ a capacity  that is central to resilient systems. Building resilience of intertwined social and ecological systems is therefore increasingly regarded as essential to enabling sustainable development at local to global scales, and is a rapidly emerging research area worldwide. The  South  African  Research  Chair  in  Social‐Ecological  Systems  and  Resilience,  held  by  Dr  Reinette  (Oonsie)  Biggs, aims to contribute to this area specifically from a southern African perspective. The Chair is hosted by  the  newly  established  Centre  for  Complex  Systems  in  Transition  (CST)  at  Stellenbosch  University.  The  CST  builds  on  a  strong  history  of  transdisciplinary  research  and  complexity  studies,  and  hosts  several  leading  scientists and  [...]

SARChI Research Chair in Social-Ecological Systems and Resilience Centre for Complex Systems in Transitions, Stellenbosch University   Regime shifts, long-lasting shifts or changes in the structure and function of social-ecological systems often occur abruptly and unexpectedly. These changes have substantial impact on ecosystem services such as crop production or food regulation that directly impacts human wellbeing. The South African Research Chair in Social-Ecological Systems and Resilience, held by Prof Reinette (Oonsie) Biggs, aims to contribute to theory, methods and understanding that can improve our capacity to assess risks and build resilience to regime shifts that may jeopardize ecosystem services and [...]