Matching Items (10)
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- All Subjects: Land use
- All Subjects: Complex Adaptive Systems
- Creators: Barton, C. Michael
- Creators: Ullah, Isaac I. T., 1979-
- Creators: Dooley, Kevin
- Status: Published
Description
This dissertation investigates the long-term consequences of human land-use practices in general, and in early agricultural villages in specific. This pioneering case study investigates the "collapse" of the Early (Pre-Pottery) Neolithic lifeway, which was a major transformational event marked by significant changes in settlement patterns, material culture, and social markers. To move beyond traditional narratives of cultural collapse, I employ a Complex Adaptive Systems approach to this research, and combine agent-based computer simulations of Neolithic land-use with dynamic and spatially-explicit GIS-based environmental models to conduct experiments into long-term trajectories of different potential Neolithic socio-environmental systems. My analysis outlines how the Early Neolithic "collapse" was likely instigated by a non-linear sequence of events, and that it would have been impossible for Neolithic peoples to recognize the long-term outcome of their actions. The experiment-based simulation approach shows that, starting from the same initial conditions, complex combinations of feedback amplification, stochasticity, responses to internal and external stimuli, and the accumulation of incremental changes to the socio-natural landscape, can lead to widely divergent outcomes over time. Thus, rather than being an inevitable consequence of specific Neolithic land-use choices, the "catastrophic" transformation at the end of the Early Neolithic was an emergent property of the Early Neolithic socio-natural system itself, and thus likely not an easily predictable event. In this way, my work uses the technique of simulation modeling to connect CAS theory with the archaeological and geoarchaeological record to help better understand the causes and consequences of socio-ecological transformation at a regional scale. The research is broadly applicable to other archaeological cases of resilience and collapse, and is truly interdisciplinary in that it draws on fields such as geomorphology, computer science, and agronomy in addition to archaeology.
ContributorsUllah, Isaac (Author) / Barton, C. Michael (Thesis advisor) / Banning, Edward B. (Committee member) / Clark, Geoffrey (Committee member) / Arrowsmith, J. Ramon (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2013
Description
Pressure from fiduciary duty leads agents within organizational systems to make decisions that result in positive feedback loops that often have inimical unintended consequences. The current corporate climate that often puts the bottom line ahead of environmental and social concerns in the name of fiduciary duty is doing so based on a revised interpretation of the term that is clearly to the benefit of the corporations. It is important to note that this modern interpretation is a radical misinterpretation of the intent of the law as our forefathers defined it. However, in spite of the fact that the modern interpretation is leading to inimical unintended consequences, providing the systems agents with the proper training and tools necessary to recognize the cost benefit of implementing sustainable solutions may mitigate some of these positive feedback loops and their associated unintended consequences. By developing tools based on sustainable frameworks we may be able to return these organizations to the original intent of fiduciary duty, which was designed to encourage investment in organizations that worked for the public benefit. A concept that is remarkably similar to the triple bottom line framework that many sustainability professionals advocate on behalf of today.
ContributorsJohnson, Lyle Eric (Author) / Laubichler, Manfred (Thesis director) / Dooley, Kevin (Committee member) / O'Neill, Dan (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / W. P. Carey School of Business (Contributor) / School of Sustainability (Contributor)
Created2015-05
ContributorsBarton, C. Michael (Author) / Ullah, Isaac I. T., 1979- (Author) / Mayer, Gary R. (Author) / Sarjoughian, Hessam S. (Author) / Bergin, Sean M. (Author) / Miller, Alexandra E. (Author) / Mitasova, H. (Author)
Created2010
Description
This dissertation explores how practices and interactions of actors at different scales structure social networks and lead to the emergence of social complexity in middle range societies. To investigate this process, I apply a complex adaptive systems approach and a methodology that combines network science with analytical tools from economics to the three sub-periods of the Prehistoric Bronze Age (The Philia Phase, PreBA 1 and PreBA 2) on Cyprus, a transformational period marked by social and economic changes evident in the material record. Using proxy data representative of three kinds of social interactions or facets of social complexity, the control of labor, participation in trade networks, and access to resources, at three scales, the community, region and whole island, my analysis demonstrates the variability in and non-linear trajectory for the emergence of social complexity in middle range society. The results of this research indicate that complexity emerges at different scales, and times in different places, and only in some facets of complexity. Cycles of emergence are apparent within the sub-periods of the PreBA, but a linear trajectory of increasing social complexity is not evident through the period. Further, this research challenges the long-held notion that Cyprus' involvement in the international metal trade lead to the emergence of complexity. Instead, I argue based on the results presented here, that the emergence of complexity is heavily influenced by endogenous processes, particularly the social interactions that limited participation in an on-island exchange system that flourished on the island during the Philia Phase, disintegrated along the North Coast during the PreBA 1 and was rebuilt across the island by the end of the period. Thus, the variation seen in the emergence of social complexity on Cyprus during the PreBA occurred as the result of a bottom-up process in which the complex and unequal interactions and relationships between social actors structured and restructured social networks across scales differently over time and space. These results speak more broadly about the variability of middle range societies and the varying conditions under which social complexity can emerge and add to our understanding of this phenomenon.
ContributorsSwantek, Laura Anne (Author) / Barton, C. Michael (Thesis advisor) / Spielmann, Katherine (Committee member) / Serwint, Nancy (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2017
ContributorsBarton, C. Michael (Author)
Created2010
Description
Invited paper presented at the Workshop on Aspects of Social and Socio-Environmental Dynamics, Arizona State University, January 2007.
ContributorsSarjoughian, Hessam S. (Author) / Barton, C. Michael (Author)
Created2007
ContributorsBarton, C. Michael (Author) / Ullah, Isaac I. T., 1979- (Author)
Created2006
ContributorsUllah, Isaac I. T., 1979- (Author) / Barton, C. Michael (Author)
Created2007
ContributorsMayer, Gary R. (Author) / Sarjoughian, Hessam S. (Author) / Allen, Eowyn K. (Author) / Falconer, Steven E. (Author) / Barton, C. Michael (Author)
Created2006
Description
The proliferation of plastic has created a wicked global sustainability challenge. From the extraction of fossil fuels to end-of-life management and pollution, plastic imposes significant negative impacts to human health, economic well-being, and the environment. One proposed solution is to replace conventional plastic with biomass-based plastics and plastic alternatives (BBPAs), such as paper or bio-based plastics. While these products may have advantageous properties, they require biomass as a feedstock. Given the scale of the plastics problem, this biomass demand may be significant. In my dissertation, I evaluate the magnitude of biomass required, and assess the potential impact of this biomass demand on global land use. After examining the scope and the scale of the problem in chapter one, I evaluate the assumptions that have been made regarding the land-use impacts of BBPAs in chapter two. In chapter three, I use a global land-system model (CLUMondo) to evaluate the potential land-use change of large-scale production of BBPAs. In chapter four, I evaluate how certification schemes could be used as a policy tool to mitigate the land-use impacts of bio-based alternatives. I find that the current studies evaluating the land-use impacts of these products make optimistic and unrealistic assumptions regarding land-use. Using a global model, I show how high production scenarios of BBPAs could induce significant land-use change at the global level. Finally, I demonstrate that reliance on certification schemes would likely be insufficient to prevent negative impacts from this scale of land change. Overall, this dissertation suggests that large-scale replacement of plastic with BBPAs could incur significant land-use impacts. Policies designed to mitigate the impacts of plastic need to account for this impact to land-use, lest they risk substituting one global problem for another.
ContributorsHelm, Levi (Author) / Kinzig, Ann (Thesis advisor) / Dooley, Kevin (Committee member) / Turner II, Billie (Committee member) / Verburg, Peter (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2023