[DSRP Evidence](https://dsrpevidence.org/)

# AMESH: An Ecosystems Approach to Managing for Sustainability and Health

## Details

**Authors** Waltner-Toews D

**Year** 2023

**Publisher** Journal of Systems Thinking 3(1):1-13

**Kind of work** article

**Discipline** Environment & Sustainability

**Secondary disciplines** Public Health

**Reading level** technical

**Kind of engagement** scholarly

[Read it at the publisher](https://doi.org/10.54120/jost.0000023) 
10.54120/jost.0000023

## In authors' words

### Abstract

Beginning in about 1990 and continuing into the present, an international network of researchers has developed and tested a methodology for integrating complex systems theories into sustainable development projects. Drawing on a theoretical understanding of complex systems and combining it with Checkland’s Soft Systems Methodology and best practices of community engagement drawn from a wide variety of sources, we have developed a methodology that is theoretically sound and practically effective. AMESH, an Adaptive Methodology for Ecosystem Sustainability and Health, has emerged from, and been tested in, Nepal, Kenya, Canada, and Peru.

### What they set out to do (purpose)

A chapter on AMESH, the Adaptive Methodology for Ecosystem Sustainability and Health: complex systems theory combined with Soft Systems Methodology and community-engagement practice.

### What they found (results)

Developed and tested by an international network since about 1990 — in Nepal, Kenya, Canada, and Peru.

## Commentary

### In short

Describes AMESH, a method for sustainable development that combines complex systems theory, Soft Systems Methodology and community engagement, tested in Nepal, Kenya, Canada and Peru.

### Response

Published in the Handbook of Systems Thinking (Cabrera, Cabrera & Midgley, eds., 2023), a volume built on the premise that systems thinking now has a universal theory—DSRP-484. Its contents were selected on that basis by its editorial team in concert with a team of advisors.

**Patterns it shows** S, P

## Refers to

- [Handbook of Systems Thinking](https://dsrpevidence.org/element/382)

**How to cite this** Waltner-Toews D (2023). AMESH: An Ecosystems Approach to Managing for Sustainability and Health. Journal of Systems Thinking 3(1):1-13.