Ecological Thought: Diversity, Wholeness and Their Resonance in Contemporary Architectural Discourse

Emerging as a scientific discipline in the nineteenth century, ecology gradually expanded its conceptual scope and moved beyond the boundaries of a natural science, exerting influence on social theory, ethics, and philosophy. As ecological thought widened, debates evolved from mechanistic and systems-based models toward relational, regenerative, and post-nature frameworks—each offering distinct ontological and epistemological interpretations of the human–environment relationship. This study adopts a qualitative and interpretive research approach to trace these conceptual developments and examine their resonance within contemporary architectural theory and practice. At the centre of the analysis are the theoretical and practical contributions of four architects and theorists, Sim Van der Ryn, Michael Sorkin, Chrisna du Plessis, and Neri Oxman, whose work exemplifies key transitions in ecological discourse. Van der Ryn’s systems ecology and ethical environmentalism, Sorkin’s socially oriented urban ecology, du Plessis’s regenerative design thinking, and Oxman’s biologically informed material ecologies collectively illustrate the plurality of ecological paradigms while revealing their shared foundations. Despite working across different scales, methods, and contexts, these figures converge on a relational understanding of nature—not as an external entity, but as a network of mutual dependencies. Accordingly, their work signals a shift in architecture from an ecology grounded in environmental preservation toward one rooted in a relational ontology that redefines the discipline’s conceptual foundations.