Marissa Devan Reno

Human ecology, resilience, and security in 2030.

Resilience is a quality that allows human systems to rebound from shocks, such as droughts or famines, floods, conflict events, and others. Human resilience is tightly coupled to human ecology, including population dynamics, resource availability, and resource consumption. The Human Resilience Index (HRI) and Modeling (HRIM) Project provides a set of tools that help explore the links among human ecological conditions, human resilience, and conflict. The HRIM allows users to simulate future scenarios and mitigation strategies. Historic calculations using the HRI show numerous times and places where declining HRI values have corresponded to instability and conflict, supporting the hypothesis that poor human ecological conditions can contribute to conflict. Seven indicators are used to calculate the HRI: population growth rate, population density, caloric intake per capita, renewable fresh water per capita, arable land per capita, median age, and population health (including infant and child mortality and life expectancy). The HRIM provides a set of tools for evaluating alternative mitigation strategies to help improve human ecological conditions, increase resilience to shocks, and reduce the threat of instability and conflict.