332
study may be studied at different scales for scientific reasons. For example, in a
study of the food system, data might be collected at a scale of plants, fields, farms,
and/or crop-growing regions. Other components of the food system might be oriented
around a geographic feature such as a river, a watershed, an aquifer, an ecoregion, or
a market area or trade zone. Against such diverse geographies, we need well-reasoned
and explicitly argued scientific reasons for the choice of scale to study.
A researcher must choose scale of a study for an integrated FEW system based
on the human and physical processes that are most important, not based on the convenience of methods, data, or tools that are provided by one scientific discipline
participating in the research. However, one must, of course, utilize methods, data,
and tools that function at the appropriate human and physical scales. This often
means that we need to build new methods, data, and tools to study FEW systems, or,
at least, that we must translate those methods, data, and tools from their original
domain into the FEW system framing and scale where we are now working. The
meso-scale is often an appropriate compromise on scale that allows us to bring these
elements together.
One scale gap that is commonly experienced in FEW nexus studies is between
the scales associated with external stressors (e.g., climate) and those associated with
socioeconomic impacts (e.g., regional droughts, reduced or increased agricultural
production, energy shortages). Another common scale gap is between shocks and
stresses (or presses and pulses, for the ecologist); shocks are fast, and sharp transient dynamics and stresses are slow and persistent dynamics. Consider also the
scale gap between individual action—which can be very agile and predictable—and
community response—which can be very slow and unpredictable.
We also noted that complex systems often have hierarchies of scale, importance,
and control (see Sect. 2.2). Despite their heterogeneity, interdependency, and emergent properties, some subsystems exert more control than others, and some scales
are more important than others. Complex systems have distributed control, but there
are centers and hubs of control. In FEW systems, some of the centers include climate, weather, natural resource availability, national governance, technology, international conflict and politics, cities, cultural consumption preferences, financial
investment, infrastructure, and large corporate business.
The appropriate spatial and temporal scales must, therefore, balance the requirements and resources of science, the spatial and temporal scales of the structures and
processes being studied, the existing and possible data, and the needs of the endusers of the results and decision-makers. Key to the appropriate choice of scale is
the phenomenon of emergence, where specific characteristics of the entire system
“emerge” from the interconnections between the fine-scale parts of the system
(again, see Sect. 2.2). A poor choice of scale can obscure emergent properties, while
a good choice of scale can accurately highlight emergent properties. For instance,
Chap. 14 describes the importance of the meso-scale as a “Goldilocks” scale where
urban–rural differences and infrastructure effects become apparent, but where we
also tend to have substantial data and tools available to study FEWS. By contrast,
the national scale is too coarse to reveal process, and the establishment scale is too
fine for the data and tools we have available.
M. Carbajales-Dale et al.
study may be studied at different scales for scientific reasons. For example, in a
study of the food system, data might be collected at a scale of plants, fields, farms,
and/or crop-growing regions. Other components of the food system might be oriented
around a geographic feature such as a river, a watershed, an aquifer, an ecoregion, or
a market area or trade zone. Against such diverse geographies, we need well-reasoned
and explicitly argued scientific reasons for the choice of scale to study.
A researcher must choose scale of a study for an integrated FEW system based
on the human and physical processes that are most important, not based on the convenience of methods, data, or tools that are provided by one scientific discipline
participating in the research. However, one must, of course, utilize methods, data,
and tools that function at the appropriate human and physical scales. This often
means that we need to build new methods, data, and tools to study FEW systems, or,
at least, that we must translate those methods, data, and tools from their original
domain into the FEW system framing and scale where we are now working. The
meso-scale is often an appropriate compromise on scale that allows us to bring these
elements together.
One scale gap that is commonly experienced in FEW nexus studies is between
the scales associated with external stressors (e.g., climate) and those associated with
socioeconomic impacts (e.g., regional droughts, reduced or increased agricultural
production, energy shortages). Another common scale gap is between shocks and
stresses (or presses and pulses, for the ecologist); shocks are fast, and sharp transient dynamics and stresses are slow and persistent dynamics. Consider also the
scale gap between individual action—which can be very agile and predictable—and
community response—which can be very slow and unpredictable.
We also noted that complex systems often have hierarchies of scale, importance,
and control (see Sect. 2.2). Despite their heterogeneity, interdependency, and emergent properties, some subsystems exert more control than others, and some scales
are more important than others. Complex systems have distributed control, but there
are centers and hubs of control. In FEW systems, some of the centers include climate, weather, natural resource availability, national governance, technology, international conflict and politics, cities, cultural consumption preferences, financial
investment, infrastructure, and large corporate business.
The appropriate spatial and temporal scales must, therefore, balance the requirements and resources of science, the spatial and temporal scales of the structures and
processes being studied, the existing and possible data, and the needs of the endusers of the results and decision-makers. Key to the appropriate choice of scale is
the phenomenon of emergence, where specific characteristics of the entire system
“emerge” from the interconnections between the fine-scale parts of the system
(again, see Sect. 2.2). A poor choice of scale can obscure emergent properties, while
a good choice of scale can accurately highlight emergent properties. For instance,
Chap. 14 describes the importance of the meso-scale as a “Goldilocks” scale where
urban–rural differences and infrastructure effects become apparent, but where we
also tend to have substantial data and tools available to study FEWS. By contrast,
the national scale is too coarse to reveal process, and the establishment scale is too
fine for the data and tools we have available.
M. Carbajales-Dale et al.