The Modern Environment is made up of Human and Natural Systems

People have interacted with the biophysical environment since the beginning of human history (Lui et. al., 2007). Preindustrial era changes in the environment on a large scale have been attributed to human influences from as early as the end of the Pleistocene, with the first human migration into the western hemisphere which resulted in major changes in land cover and mass die off of megafauna (Sauer, 1944). A more contemporary preindustrial example is the population crashes associated with Columbian encounters in the late 15^th/ early 16^th centuries (Dull et. al., 2010). Since the industrial revolution, the scope and intensity of human interactions with the natural system have increased dramatically (Lui et al., 2007).  Today human activities have altered most of the world’s ecosystems to a greater or lesser extent (Vitousek et al., 1997; Sanderson et al., 2002).  Either through direct (e.g. removal of natural soil, dam construction, harvesting, pollution, deforestation) or indirect human intervention (e.g. erosion due to lack of vegetation, overgrazing, climate change), humankind has significantly increased their role in the ecosystem (Hobbs et al., 2006). This raises the question of whether there truly exists a natural environment anymore, or is the modern environment made up of both human and natural systems.

Thinking about the environment as a couple human and natural systems (CHANS) is a better framework for analysis of conservation and people’s role in persevering and maintaining the environment. CHANS are systems in which human and natural components interact (Lui et al., 2007).  Research in this framework focuses on linking human and natural systems, not just acknowledging the relationship.  Evaluations of the interconnectedness of the human and natural systems can be seen in works on the effectiveness of protected areas (PAs) in safeguarding ecosystems.  PAs is one of Earth’s most significant land-use designations with nearly every nation of the world participating, and over 100,000 areas of lands being set aside for conservation (Lockwood et al., 2006).  The major question is how effective is this tool at the goal of protecting the environment?  In some cases PAs failed to meet the goal of preserving high quality habitat, like in the case of forest degradation in Myanmar within PAs (see Htun et al., 2006), where establishments of PAs was not enough in preventing degradation of forests, although it did reduce deforestation (Htun et al., 2006).  This outcome was attributed to the continued use of forest by local populations for firewood.  Setting aside the PA did not remove the human need for the land or its resources, thus this policy ignored the human system.  Without fixing the underlying cause for environmental degradation, simply putting the land as protected did not stop its continued ruin.

Human impacts on the environment can come in indirect forms that are unexpected like those associated with climate change due to land cover changes.  The Amazon is an excellent example of how the natural system has complicated interactions between climate and land cover, where reinforcing feedbacks from the forests promotes climatic patterns that sustain the forest.  Walker et al. (2009) evaluated Amazonian PAs to evaluate the influences of land cover of the surrounding areas on regional climate models.  These models showed that PAs are not walled off ecosystems, they are impacted by their surroundings, thus if protecting the PAs is the goal, it is necessary to develop within limits the surrounding.   They found that natural systems are resistant to human interaction up to a tipping point, where rapid changes in the environment take place (Walker et al. 2009). Understanding this coupled system can lead to better management schemes to avoid these points of no return.

The Environment is not just the natural system, but people are part of it too.  Human systems will have interactions and impacts with natural systems creating what we understand as the Environment. When trying to preserve the Environment, it is necessary not only to think about the ecosystem, but also the human systems involved.  The primary goal for environmental protection is to preserve the natural environment, but the problem is that there is no such thing anymore.  The environment is both natural and human, and to preserve it you must look at both aspects.

Works Cited

Dull, R. A., Nevle, R. J., Woods, W. I., Bird, D. K., Avnery, S., & Denevan, W. M. (2010). The Columbian encounter and the Little Ice Age: Abrupt land use change, fire, and greenhouse forcing. Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 100(4), 755-771.

Hobbs, R. J., Arico, S., Aronson, J., Baron, J. S., Bridgewater, P., Cramer, V. A., ... & Zobel, M. (2006). Novel ecosystems: theoretical and management aspects of the new ecological world order. Global ecology and biogeography,15(1), 1-7.

Htun, N. Z., Mizoue, N., Kajisa, T., & Yoshida, S. (2009). Deforestation and forest degradation as measures of Popa Mountain Park (Myanmar) effectiveness. Environmental Conservation, 36(3), 218.

Liu, J., Dietz, T., Carpenter, S. R., Folke, C., Alberti, M., Redman, C. L., ... & Provencher, W. (2007). Coupled human and natural systems. AMBIO: A Journal of the Human Environment, 36(8), 639-649.

Lockwood, M., Worboys, G. L., & Kothari, A. (Eds.). (2006). Managing protected areas: a global guide. Earthscan.

Sanderson, E. W., Jaiteh, M., Levy, M. A., Redford, K. H., Wannebo, A. V., & Woolmer, G. (2002). The Human Footprint and the Last of the Wild: The human footprint is a global map of human influence on the land surface, which suggests that human beings are stewards of nature, whether we like it or not. BioScience, 52(10), 891-904.

Sauer, C. O. (1944). A geographic sketch of early man in America. Geographical Review, 34(4), 529-573.

Vitousek, P. M., Mooney, H. A., Lubchenco, J., & Melillo, J. M. (1997). Human domination of Earth's ecosystems. Science, 277(5325), 494-499.

Walker, R., Moore, N. J., Arima, E., Perz, S., Simmons, C., Caldas, M., ... & Bohrer, C. (2009). Protecting the Amazon with protected areas. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 106(26), 10582-10586.