Critical Transitions in Nature and Society

Critical Transitions in Nature and Society

Author: Marten Scheffer

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2020-11-10

Total Pages: 398

ISBN-13: 1400833272

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

How do we explain the remarkably abrupt changes that sometimes occur in nature and society--and can we predict why and when they happen? This book offers a comprehensive introduction to critical transitions in complex systems--the radical changes that happen at tipping points when thresholds are passed. Marten Scheffer accessibly describes the dynamical systems theory behind critical transitions, covering catastrophe theory, bifurcations, chaos, and more. He gives examples of critical transitions in lakes, oceans, terrestrial ecosystems, climate, evolution, and human societies. And he demonstrates how to deal with these transitions, offering practical guidance on how to predict tipping points, how to prevent "bad" transitions, and how to promote critical transitions that work for us and not against us. Scheffer shows the time is ripe for understanding and managing critical transitions in the vast and complex systems in which we live. This book can also serve as a textbook and includes a detailed appendix with equations. Provides an accessible introduction to dynamical systems theory Covers critical transitions in lakes, oceans, terrestrial ecosystems, the climate, evolution, and human societies Explains how to predict tipping points Offers strategies for preventing "bad" transitions and triggering "good" ones Features an appendix with equations


Societies in Transition in Early Greece

Societies in Transition in Early Greece

Author: Alex R. Knodell

Publisher: Univ of California Press

Published: 2021-05-25

Total Pages: 382

ISBN-13: 0520380541

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

A free open access ebook is available upon publication. Learn more at www.luminosoa.org. Situated at the disciplinary boundary between prehistory and history, this book presents a new synthesis of Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age Greece, from the rise and fall of Mycenaean civilization, through the "Dark Age," and up to the emergence of city-states in the Archaic period. This period saw the growth and decline of varied political systems and the development of networks that would eventually expand to nearly all shores of the Middle Sea. Alex R. Knodell argues that in order to understand how ancient Greece changed over time, one must analyze how Greek societies constituted and reconstituted themselves across multiple scales, from the local to the regional to the Mediterranean. Knodell employs innovative network and spatial analyses to understand the regional diversity and connectivity that drove the growth of early Greek polities. As a groundbreaking study of landscape, interaction, and sociopolitical change, Societies in Transition in Early Greece systematically bridges the divide between the Mycenaean period and the Archaic Greek world to shed new light on an often-overlooked period of world history.


Transitions in Society

Transitions in Society

Author: Colin M. Bain

Publisher: Don Mills, Ont. : Oxford University Press

Published: 2002

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9780195417685

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Trillium Listed!Transitions in Society: The Challenge of Change explores the many trends and issues in Canada's ever-changing society. This is a full-colour text written specifically for the new Grade 12 course in Ontario called Challenge and Change in Society.The unit structure mirrors the new curriculum strands: Social Change, Social Trends and Social Challenges. Each unit also examines a group of specific social science skills: Conducting research in the Social Sciences, Processing and Interpreting reseach findings, and Communicating researchfindings.Specific features include Film Society, Competing Perspectives, Focus on Issues, and Groundbreakers.


Grand Transitions

Grand Transitions

Author: Vaclav Smil

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2021-02-12

Total Pages: 385

ISBN-13: 0190060689

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

From one of the world's leading experts on the history of energy, a rigorous examination of the transitions that structure our modern world--and the environmental reckoning that will mark its success or failure. What makes the modern world work? The answer to this deceptively simple question lies in four "grand transitions" of civilization--in populations, agriculture, energy, and economics--which have transformed the way we live. Societies that have undergone all four transitions emerge into an era of radically different population dynamics, food surpluses (and waste), abundant energy use, and expanding economic opportunities. Simultaneously, in other parts of the world, hundreds of millions remain largely untouched by these developments. Through erudite storytelling, Vaclav Smil investigates the fascinating and complex interactions of these transitions. He argues that the moral imperative to share modernity's benefits has become more acute with increasing economic inequality, but addressing this imbalance would make it exceedingly difficult to implement the changes necessary for the long-term preservation of the environment. Thus, managing the fifth transition--environmental changes from natural-resource depletion, biodiversity loss, and global warming--will determine the success or eventual failure of the grand transitions that have made the world we live in today.


Youth Transitions

Youth Transitions

Author: René Bendit

Publisher: Barbara Budrich

Published: 2008-11-19

Total Pages: 384

ISBN-13: 3866491441

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Youth and the future What will become of today’s young people in Australia, Asia, Europe, Latin America and North America? Will they be supportive of the world they live in? Or are they doomed to be criminal drop-outs? The authors investigate to which extent different and contradictory trends of social modernisation and economic progress determine the biographical development and social integration of young people in different countries and world regions. Thus, the authors look at the role young people themselves can play in the future; either as construc tive social actors or as a problematic – and partly excluded – group unable to face the challenges of a permanently changing world.


Responses to Change

Responses to Change

Author: Center for Creative Leadership (CCL)

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2011-08-15

Total Pages: 34

ISBN-13: 1118155041

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The ongoing state of many organizations is one of change. People who experience major change tend to exhibit one of four patterns of response: entrenched, overwhelmed, poser, or learner. As a leader, you need to understand the patterns of response that people express and to customize intervention strategies to help them make the transition. People can pass through a given response stage and move to one that is more effective--especially if you provide timely intervention and support. This guidebook will help you understand how people, including yourself, are responding to change and what you can do to help them move forward.


Ambiguous Transitions

Ambiguous Transitions

Author: Jill Massino

Publisher: Berghahn Books

Published: 2019-07-30

Total Pages: 466

ISBN-13: 1785335995

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Focusing on youth, family, work, and consumption, Ambiguous Transitions analyzes the interplay between gender and citizenship postwar Romania. By juxtaposing official sources with oral histories and socialist policies with everyday practices, Jill Massino illuminates the gendered dimensions of socialist modernization and its complex effects on women’s roles, relationships, and identities. Analyzing women as subjects and agents, the book examines how they negotiated the challenges that arose as Romanian society modernized, even as it clung to traditional ideas about gender. Massino concludes by exploring the ambiguities of postsocialism, highlighting how the legacies of the past have shaped politics and women’s lived experiences since 1989.


Transitions

Transitions

Author: William Bridges

Publisher: Da Capo Lifelong Books

Published: 2004-08-11

Total Pages: 209

ISBN-13: 0738211427

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The best-selling guide for coping with changes in life and work, named one of the 50 all-time best books in self-help and personal development Whether you choose it or it is thrust upon you, change brings both opportunities and turmoil. Since Transitions was first published, this supportive guide has helped hundreds of thousands of readers cope with these issues by providing an elegantly simple yet profoundly insightful roadmap of the transition process. With the understanding born of both personal and professional experience, William Bridges takes readers step by step through the three stages of any transition: The Ending, The Neutral Zone, and, eventually, The New Beginning. Bridges explains how each stage can be understood and embraced, leading to meaningful and productive movement into a hopeful future. With a new introduction highlighting how the advice in the book continues to apply and is perhaps even more relevant today, and a new chapter devoted to change in the workplace, Transitions will remain the essential guide for coping with the one constant in life: change.


Role Transitions

Role Transitions

Author: Vernon L. Allen

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2012-12-06

Total Pages: 365

ISBN-13: 1461326974

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The concept of role transition refers to a wide range of experiences found in life: job change, unemployment, divorce, entering or leaving prison, retirement, immi gration, "Gastarbeiten," becoming a parent, and so on. Such transitions often produce strain and hence a variety of problems for the transiting individual, occu pants of complementary social positions, and other members of one's social group and community. In spite of the diversity of role transitions that occur, however, it is important also to realize that many basic psychological processes can be discerned in ostensibly different instances. Research on role transitions has been dispersed across many different subdisci of the social sciences; the problem can be investigated from several points of plines view and levels of analysis. As modern societies become ever more complex, role transitions can be expected to increase in number and diversity, with a concomitant increase in detrimental consequences for the individual and society. Hence, for rea sons of both theory and practice, improved conceptual models and new empirical data are needed. The chapters in this book are the outcome of a N.A.T.O. symposium convened for the purpose of discussing aspects of role transitions from international and inter disciplinary perspectives. The meeting was designed to be a working conference to facilitate as much intellectual exchange and debate among participants as possible.


Young People and Housing

Young People and Housing

Author: Ray Forrest

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2013

Total Pages: 266

ISBN-13: 0415633354

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Young People and Housing brings together new research exploring the economic, social, and cultural challenges that face young people in search of permanent housing. Featuring international case studies from Asia, Europe, and Australia, Young People and Housing is a collection of groundbreaking work from leading scholars in housing policy. Younger generations across a wide range of societies face increasing difficulties in gaining access to housing. Housing occupies a pivotal position in the transition from parental dependence to adult independence. Delayed independence has significant implications for marriage and family formation, fertility, inter and intra generational tensions, social mobility and social inequalities. The social and cultural dimensions are, of course, enormously varied with strong contrasts between Asian and Western societies in terms of intergenerational norms and practices in relation to housing. Nevertheless, younger households in China (including Hong Kong), Japan, the USA, Australasia and Europe face very similar challenges in the housing sphere. Moreover, concerns about the housing future for younger generations are gaining greater policy and popular prominence in many countries.