Resilience Science Must-Knows

The report "Resilience Science Must-Knows" synthesizes decades of research into nine fundamental principles designed to guide decision-makers in building systemic resilience. It defines resilience as the capacity to live and develop amidst change and uncertainty, emphasizing a balance between coping, adapting, and transforming systems to ensure human prosperity within planetary boundaries.

• Resilience is essential for navigating the Anthropocene, a period where human activity is the primary driver of climate and ecosystem change. With six of nine planetary boundaries already exceeded, the Earth's natural safety nets—such as oceans absorbing 90% of excess heat—are under severe pressure, increasing the risk of irreversible tipping points.
• Systemic resilience requires a balance of three core capacities: coping (the ability to persist and recover from shocks without major rupture), adapting (adjusting to new conditions while maintaining essential functions), and transforming (fundamentally redesigning systems that are unjust or unsustainable).
• Proactive investment in resilience provides a "triple dividend": it reduces the costs of disruptive events, stimulates economic growth by strengthening infrastructure and institutions, and generates social and environmental benefits such as improved public health and biodiversity.
• Resilience is a continuous cyclical process rather than a fixed goal. It involves phases of rapid change, where crises can catalyze innovation and institutional reform, and phases of gradual change or stability, where innovations are consolidated but risks of rigidity and "lock-in" emerge.
• Diversity is a fundamental pillar of resilience, acting as insurance against systemic failure and a source of innovation. This includes functional diversity (e.g., polyculture in agriculture), capital diversity (natural, social, and built), social diversity (varied networks and norms), and cognitive diversity (diverse perspectives and problem-solving styles).
• Strong relationships between people and with nature are critical for resilience. While connectivity facilitates the flow of resources and knowledge, "hyperconnectivity" in global trade and finance can create fragility by allowing shocks to propagate rapidly across borders.
• Effective resilience governance must explicitly negotiate trade-offs, as decisions often benefit one group or scale at the expense of another. The report advocates for collaborative, polycentric, and adaptive governance models that distribute decision-making across multiple overlapping centers.
• Agency—the ability to make and implement decisions—is the engine that activates coping, adaptation, and transformation. Agency is not automatic and must be supported through structural changes and equitable access to resources, as it is often concentrated in the hands of powerful actors.
• Equitable resilience requires directly addressing social inequalities, power imbalances, and historical injustices. Without a focus on equity, resilience initiatives risk reinforcing the status quo or creating "green" exclusions that marginalize vulnerable populations.

APA

A., N., C., Q., M., N., A., J.-A., A., J., A., M., N., M., G., P., M., B., C., B., R., B., E., B., W., B., K., B., S.R., C., G., C., C., D. C., F., D., R., F., ... G., Z. (2025). Resilience Science Must-Knows. Global Resilience Partnership. https://www.globalresiliencepartnership.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/rsmk_pt_digital.pdf

Chicago

A., Norström, Queiroz C., Nyström M., Jiménez-Aceituno A., Jonsson A., McFadden A., Milton N., et al. Resilience Science Must-Knows. Global Resilience Partnership, 2025. https://www.globalresiliencepartnership.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/rsmk_pt_digital.pdf.

Wikipedia

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BibTeX

@techreport{a2025resilience, author = {A., Norström and C., Queiroz and M., Nyström and A., Jiménez-Aceituno and A., Jonsson and A., McFadden and N., Milton and G., Peterson and M., Barnes and C., Béné and R., Biggs and E., Boyd and W., Broadgate and K., Brown and S.R., Carpenter and G., Collins and C., de Coning and F., Denton and R., Ferreira and C., Folke and L., Gordon and M., Hamann and J., Hornberg and T., McPhearson and H., Nagendra and C., Ringler and J., Rockström and P., Romero-Lankao and M., Scheffer and F., Westley and G., Ziervogel}, title = {{Resilience Science Must-Knows}}, institution = {Global Resilience Partnership}, year = {2025}, url = {https://www.globalresiliencepartnership.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/rsmk_pt_digital.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }