Victor Galaz

Victor Galaz holds a Ph.D. in political science, and is currently working as a researcher and theme leader for Adaptive Governance at the Stockholm Resilience Centre. Among his publications in English are articles in the journals Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, Environmental Politics, Ambio, Ecology and Society, and Governance.

Research interest

Catastrophic thresholds, surprises and cascading crises seem to be a generic feature of interconnected biophysical and socioeconomic systems. Victor Galaz´ research elaborates the major governance challenges posed by "double complexity": the fact that societies not only have to cope with the intriguing non-linear behaviour of multilevel complex systems such as social-ecological systems (SES) - but also that we need to achieve it with governance systems that themselves embed complexity — i.e. multiple actor and institutional interactions, periods of incremental followed by sudden change, and continuous adjustments and change.

Can we really harness resilience in complex SES, with complexity? What is the role of rapid information technological change? Is it possible to strike a proper balance between efficiency and robustness, centralization and decentralization, and social diversity and steering control, to cope with the challenges posed by global environmental change?