A modeler's guide to studying the resilience of social-technical-environmental systems

The concept of `resilience' is increasingly being applied in the study of social-technical-environmental systems in Earth system and sustainability science. However, the diversity of resilience concepts and a certain (sometimes intended) openness of proposed definitions can lead to misunderstandings and impede their application to systems modelling. We propose an approach that aims to ease communication as well as to support systematic development of research questions and models in the context of resilience. It can be applied independently of the modelling framework or underlying theory of choice. At the heart of this guideline is a checklist consisting of four questions to be answered: (i) Resilience of what? (ii) Resilience regarding what? (iii) Resilience against what? (iv) Resilience how? We refer to the answers to these resilience questions as the "system", the "sustainant", the "adverse influence", and the "response options". The term `sustainant' is a neologism describing the feature of the system (state, structure, function, pathway etc.) that should be maintained (or restored quickly enough) in order to call the system resilient.
The use of this proposed guideline is demonstrated for two application examples: fisheries, and the Amazon rainforest. The examples illustrate the diversity of possible answers to the checklist's questions as well as their benefits in structuring the modelling process. The guideline supports the modeller in communicating precisely what is actually meant by `resilience' in a specific context. This combination of freedom and precision could help to advance the resilience discourse by building a bridge between those demanding unambiguous definitions and those stressing the benefits of generality and flexibility of the resilience concept.