TY - JOUR
T1 - Groundwater Connections and Sustainability in Social-Ecological Systems
AU - Huggins, Xander
AU - Gleeson, Tom
AU - Castilla-Rho, Juan
AU - Holley, Cameron
AU - Re, Viviana
AU - Famiglietti, James S.
N1 - Funding Information:
We would like to thank Leonard Konikow, Charles Andrews, and four anonymous reviewers for their comments and suggestions that helped improve the quality of the manuscript. X.H. was supported by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) of Canada through an Alexander Graham Bell Canada Graduate Scholarship. J.C.R and C.H. were supported by an Australian Research Council Discovery Project grant (DP190101584). Figure 2 was produced by modifying and assembling individual vector symbols from the Integration and Application Network ( ian.umces.edu/media‐library ), under CC BY‐SA 4.0. Creators of individual symbols used are: Catherine Collier, Jason C. Fisher, Alexandra Fries, Jane Hawkey, Max Hermanson, Kim Kraeer, Emily Nastase, Tracey Saxby, Dylan Taillie, Jane Thomas, and Lucy Van Essen‐Fishman. Icons in Figures 2 and 4 are used from The Noun Project ( thenounproject.com/ ) under CC BY‐NC‐ND 2.0. Creators of individual icons used are Andre Buand, Adrien Coquet, Fran Couto, Eucalyp, Jie‐eah, Oksana Latysheva, P Thanga Vignesh, Hakan Yalcin, and Cuputo. Use of the planetary boundaries image in Figure 2 is licensed under CC BY 4.0. The image was designed by Azote for Stockholm Resilience Centre, based on analysis in Persson et al. ( 2022 ), Wang‐Erlandsson et al. ( 2022 ), and Steffen et al. ( 2015 ).
Funding Information:
We would like to thank Leonard Konikow, Charles Andrews, and four anonymous reviewers for their comments and suggestions that helped improve the quality of the manuscript. X.H. was supported by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) of Canada through an Alexander Graham Bell Canada Graduate Scholarship. J.C.R and C.H. were supported by an Australian Research Council Discovery Project grant (DP190101584). Figure 2 was produced by modifying and assembling individual vector symbols from the Integration and Application Network (ian.umces.edu/media-library), under CC BY-SA 4.0. Creators of individual symbols used are: Catherine Collier, Jason C. Fisher, Alexandra Fries, Jane Hawkey, Max Hermanson, Kim Kraeer, Emily Nastase, Tracey Saxby, Dylan Taillie, Jane Thomas, and Lucy Van Essen-Fishman. Icons in Figures 2 and 4 are used from The Noun Project (thenounproject.com/) under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0. Creators of individual icons used are Andre Buand, Adrien Coquet, Fran Couto, Eucalyp, Jie-eah, Oksana Latysheva, P Thanga Vignesh, Hakan Yalcin, and Cuputo. Use of the planetary boundaries image in Figure 2 is licensed under CC BY 4.0. The image was designed by Azote for Stockholm Resilience Centre, based on analysis in Persson et al. (2022), Wang-Erlandsson et al. (2022), and Steffen et al. (2015).
Publisher Copyright:
© 2023 The Authors. Groundwater published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of National Ground Water Association.
PY - 2023/3/16
Y1 - 2023/3/16
N2 - Groundwater resources are connected with social, economic, ecological, and Earth systems. We introduce the framing of groundwater-connected systems to better represent the nature and complexity of these connections in data collection, scientific investigations, governance and management approaches, and groundwater education. Groundwater-connected systems are social, economic, ecological, and Earth systems that interact with groundwater, such as irrigated agriculture, groundwater-dependent ecosystems, and cultural relationships to groundwater expressions such as springs and rivers. Groundwater-connected systems form social-ecological systems with complex behaviors such as feedbacks, nonlinear processes, multiple stable system states, and path dependency. These complex behaviors are only visible through this integrated system framing and are not endogenous properties of physical groundwater systems. The framing is syncretic as it aims to provide a common conceptual foundation for the growing disciplines of socio-hydrogeology, eco-hydrogeology, groundwater governance, and hydro-social groundwater analysis. The framing also facilitates greater alignment between the groundwater sustainability discourse and emerging sustainability concepts and principles. Aligning with these concepts and principles presents groundwater sustainability as more than a physical state to be reached; and argues that place-based and multifaceted goals, values, justice, knowledge systems, governance, and management must continually be integrated to maintain groundwater's social, ecological, and Earth system functions. The groundwater-connected systems framing can underpin a broad, methodologically pluralistic, and community-driven new wave of data collection and analysis, research, governance, management, and education. These developments, together, can invigorate efforts to foster sustainable groundwater futures in the complex systems groundwater is embedded within.
AB - Groundwater resources are connected with social, economic, ecological, and Earth systems. We introduce the framing of groundwater-connected systems to better represent the nature and complexity of these connections in data collection, scientific investigations, governance and management approaches, and groundwater education. Groundwater-connected systems are social, economic, ecological, and Earth systems that interact with groundwater, such as irrigated agriculture, groundwater-dependent ecosystems, and cultural relationships to groundwater expressions such as springs and rivers. Groundwater-connected systems form social-ecological systems with complex behaviors such as feedbacks, nonlinear processes, multiple stable system states, and path dependency. These complex behaviors are only visible through this integrated system framing and are not endogenous properties of physical groundwater systems. The framing is syncretic as it aims to provide a common conceptual foundation for the growing disciplines of socio-hydrogeology, eco-hydrogeology, groundwater governance, and hydro-social groundwater analysis. The framing also facilitates greater alignment between the groundwater sustainability discourse and emerging sustainability concepts and principles. Aligning with these concepts and principles presents groundwater sustainability as more than a physical state to be reached; and argues that place-based and multifaceted goals, values, justice, knowledge systems, governance, and management must continually be integrated to maintain groundwater's social, ecological, and Earth system functions. The groundwater-connected systems framing can underpin a broad, methodologically pluralistic, and community-driven new wave of data collection and analysis, research, governance, management, and education. These developments, together, can invigorate efforts to foster sustainable groundwater futures in the complex systems groundwater is embedded within.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85152015705&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1111/gwat.13305
DO - 10.1111/gwat.13305
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85152015705
SN - 0017-467X
VL - 61
SP - 463
EP - 478
JO - Groundwater
JF - Groundwater
IS - 4
ER -