Review article: Drought as a continuum – memory effects in interlinked hydrological, ecological, and social systems

Abstract. Droughts are often long-lasting phenomena, without a distinct start or end and with impacts cascading across sectors and systems, creating long-term legacies. Nevertheless, our current perceptions and management of droughts and their impacts are often event-based, which can limit the effective assessment of drought risks and reduction of drought impacts. Here, we advocate for changing this perspective and viewing drought as a hydrological–ecological–social continuum. We take a systems theory perspective and focus on how “memory” causes feedback and interactions between parts of the interconnected systems at different timescales. We first discuss the characteristics of the drought continuum with a focus on the hydrological, ecological, and social systems separately, and then we study the system of systems. Our analysis is based on a review of the literature and a study of five cases: Chile, the Colorado River basin in the USA, northeast Brazil, Kenya, and the Rhine River basin in northwest Europe. We find that the memories of past dry and wet periods, carried by both bio-physical (e.g. groundwater, vegetation) and social systems (e.g. people, governance), influence how future drought risk manifests. We identify four archetypes of drought dynamics: impact and recovery, slow resilience building, gradual collapse, and high resilience–big shock. The interactions between the hydrological, ecological, and social systems result in systems shifting between these types, which plays out differently in the five case studies. We call for more research on drought preconditions and recovery in different systems, on dynamics cascading between systems and triggering system changes, and on dynamic vulnerability and maladaptation. Additionally, we advocate for more continuous monitoring of drought hazards and impacts, modelling tools that better incorporate memories and adaptation responses, and management strategies that increase societal and institutional memory. This will help us to better deal with the complex hydrological–ecological–social drought continuum and identify effective pathways to adaptation and mitigation.

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Publication Details

Journal
Natural hazards and earth system sciences
Published
2024-09-23
DOI
https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-24-3173-2024
Citations
53
Primary Topic
Hydrology and Drought Analysis
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
14.98

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article

Review article: Drought as a continuum – memory effects in interlinked hydrological, ecological, and social systems

Riccardo Biella, Germano Ribeiro Neto, Margaret Garcia, Franciska T. de Vries et al.
53 citations
Natural hazards and earth system sciences
Hydrology and Drought Analysis
14.98
article

Review article: Drought as a continuum – memory effects in interlinked hydrological, ecological, and social systems

Riccardo Biella, Germano Ribeiro Neto, Margaret Garcia, Franciska T. de Vries, Marlies H. Barendrecht, Monica Ioniță, Johanna Mård, Viorica Nagavciuc, Sarra Kchouk, Ileen Streefkerk, Anne F. Van Loon, Sina Khatami, Yiheng Du, Anastasiya Shyrokaya, Patricia Trambauer, Khalid Hassaballah, Claudia Teutschbein, Faranak Tootoonchi, Robert Stefański, Giuliano Di Baldassarre, Ana Bastos, Marthe Wens, Alessia Matanó, Roshanak Tootoonchi, Juan Pablo Boisier, Valentin Aich, Charles H. Luce, Louise Cavalcante, Tirthankar Roy, René Garreaud, Shreedhar Maskey, Ilias Pechlivanidis, Giulia Vico, Elena Ridolfi, Moses Mwangi, Minchao Wu, Johanna Koehler, Micha Werner, Mauricio Galleguillos, Camila Álvarez-Garretón, Heidi D. Mendoza, Ruben Weesie, Elizabeth A. Koebele
article en
53 citations

Abstract

Abstract. Droughts are often long-lasting phenomena, without a distinct start or end and with impacts cascading across sectors and systems, creating long-term legacies. Nevertheless, our current perceptions and management of droughts and their impacts are often event-based, which can limit the effective assessment of drought risks and reduction of drought impacts. Here, we advocate for changing this perspective and viewing drought as a hydrological–ecological–social continuum. We take a systems theory perspective and focus on how “memory” causes feedback and interactions between parts of the interconnected systems at different timescales. We first discuss the characteristics of the drought continuum with a focus on the hydrological, ecological, and social systems separately, and then we study the system of systems. Our analysis is based on a review of the literature and a study of five cases: Chile, the Colorado River basin in the USA, northeast Brazil, Kenya, and the Rhine River basin in northwest Europe. We find that the memories of past dry and wet periods, carried by both bio-physical (e.g. groundwater, vegetation) and social systems (e.g. people, governance), influence how future drought risk manifests. We identify four archetypes of drought dynamics: impact and recovery, slow resilience building, gradual collapse, and high resilience–big shock. The interactions between the hydrological, ecological, and social systems result in systems shifting between these types, which plays out differently in the five case studies. We call for more research on drought preconditions and recovery in different systems, on dynamics cascading between systems and triggering system changes, and on dynamic vulnerability and maladaptation. Additionally, we advocate for more continuous monitoring of drought hazards and impacts, modelling tools that better incorporate memories and adaptation responses, and management strategies that increase societal and institutional memory. This will help us to better deal with the complex hydrological–ecological–social drought continuum and identify effective pathways to adaptation and mitigation.

Natural hazards and earth system sciencesVol. 24(9)
Ştefan cel Mare University of Suceava (RO), Uppsala University (SE), Alfred-Wegener-Institut Helmholtz-Zentrum für Polar- und Meeresforschung (DE), Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute (SE), Bush Heritage Australia (AU), US Forest Service (US), World Meteorological Organization (CH), University of Nevada, Reno (US), The University of Melbourne (AU), King's College London (GB), Lund University (SE), University of Trento (IT), Adolfo Ibáñez University (CL), South Eastern Kenya University (KE), IHE Delft Institute for Water Education (NL), Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SE), University of Oxford (GB), Futures Group (United States) (US), Deltares (NL), IGAD Climate Prediction and Applications Center (KE), Rocky Mountain Research Station (US), Center for Climate and Resilience Research (CL), Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry (DE), Centre of Natural Hazards and Disaster Science (SE), Arizona State University (US), University of Chile (CL), Sapienza University of Rome (IT), Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (NL), University of Amsterdam (NL), Wageningen University & Research (NL), Leipzig University (DE)
Stiftelsen Oscar och Lili Lamms Minne, Horizon 2020, H2020 Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions
Openalex Percentile: Top 0%
Hydrology and Drought Analysis
14.98
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