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# Catastrophic Thresholds: A Synthesis of Concepts, Perspectives, and Applications

## Details

**Authors** Briske, David D. and Washington-Allen, Robert A. and Johnson, Craig R. and Lockwood, Jeffrey A. and Lockwood, Dale R. and Stringham, Tamzen K. and Shugart, Herman H.

**Year** 2010

**Publisher** Ecology and Society

**Kind of work** article

**Discipline** Ecology

**Secondary disciplines** Environment & Sustainability

**Applied** false

[Read it at the publisher](https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-03681-150337) 
10.5751/ES-03681-150337

## In authors' words

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

To synthesize views on threshold dynamics in complex ecosystems drawn from rangeland, disease transmission and insect pest research, and to bring them to bear on management.

### Who or what was studied (sample)

Synthesis across rangeland ecosystems, disease transmission and insect pest populations.

### How they did it (methods)

Multi-author conceptual synthesis (a Ecology and Society feature); no single dataset.

### What they found (results)

Threshold behavior in ecological systems shows convergence across several fields. Management is more practical when it monitors structural indicators correlated with vulnerability or proximity to thresholds than when it tries to locate thresholds exactly. Scale strongly shapes thresholds, so cross-scale analysis and an integrated multi-scale framework are needed.

## Commentary

### In short

Researchers working on rangelands, disease and insect pests find similar threshold behavior in ecosystems and argue that managers should track indicators of vulnerability across scales instead of trying to pinpoint exact tipping points.

### Response

Thresholds are a case of distinction (a boundary between ecosystem states), the cross-scale emphasis is a statement about systems at nested levels, and the feedback loops and triggers are relationships. The fit is partial: the paper is a synthesis rather than a test, and it does not treat perspective as a theme. Only the abstract page was read.

**Patterns it shows** D, S, R

Shows the structure is there

**Added** 2026-10-22

**How to cite this** Briske, David D. and Washington-Allen, Robert A. and Johnson, Craig R. and Lockwood, Jeffrey A. and Lockwood, Dale R. and Stringham, Tamzen K. and Shugart, Herman H. (2010). Catastrophic Thresholds: A Synthesis of Concepts, Perspectives, and Applications. Ecology and Society.