The Ecology of Resistance: How to Survive a Coup

When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe.

~John Muir

Resist! is the call of the day. Protesters are shouting it. Newscasters are blowing its siren. Artists are painting it. Protectors are taking action. We’re all grappling with what this means in practice—how to translate the conceptual to the practical: What actions can and should we take? What is most effective? How should we be thinking about all of this? How do we stay safe?

I’m grateful for the dedicated souls out there working to keep us informed, wading through the chaos to deliver discernible truths, helping us place today’s events in historical context, and gathering and presenting sorely needed resources around the mind-bending question of What the fuck do we actually do? [See as a few examples:

Robert Reich

,

Dan Froomkin

,

Kristofer Goldsmith

,

Amy Siskind

. Thank you all. You are wayfinders.]

As we frame future action, I offer a window into the meaning of the concepts of resistance and resilience in the context of the natural world. Resistance refers to the capacity—of individual organisms, communities of organisms, entire ecosystems—to weather a disturbance without loss of structure and function, while resilience is the capacity to recover structure and function after loss. When we talk of ecosystem structure, we’re referring to the organization and composition (spatial variability, biodiversity, size, location, etc.) of biotic components—plants, animals, fungi, bacteria—and abiotic elements—soil, water, atmosphere. Ecosystem function describes the biological, chemical, and physical processes occurring within a system, that is, the flow of energy and materials through and between living organisms and abiotic components. These processes include primary production, nutrient and water cycling, decomposition, and more—essentially, the pumps that fuel and regulate entire ecosystems and the planet as a whole.

By way of example, the resistance of a forest ecosystem describes its capacity to withstand disturbances like pests, diseases, droughts, or wildfires without loss, while its resilience refers to its ability to recover after loss by these disturbance. Factors such as species diversity, age distribution, density, canopy cover, connectivity, soil structure, and climate play key roles in determining both resistance and resilience. Resistance, for instance, can be seen in a forest with a variety of trees species—and thus diverse canopy height—better able to a windstorm than a monoculture forest where all trees are of similar height. Trees with deep root systems capable of accessing water from deeper soil layers show greater resistance to drought than shallow-rooted trees. Resilience can been seen in a forest with a healthy seed bank capable of rapid regeneration after fire, and in mixed-species, early successional forests capable of swift recolonization after, for instance, a landslide.

So what does this mean for us? Today we are up against acute threat to everything we hold dear. We face grave disturbance to the structure and function of our democracy and society as a whole, of our families, and of our individual beings. Our fundamental freedoms and rights are in peril. [Envision structure as the framework holding society together—the established relationships and institutions—for example, the legal, governmental, economic, and educational systems, while function refers to the role of various structural components in society, providing, for instance, healthcare, education, and public works; sharing cultural practices; upholding the rights and freedoms of democracy.]

First and foremost, we must resist to limit the damage to the structure and function of our democracy and society. Where we suffer inevitable losses, our capacity to recover from those losses will be a function of our resilience—as individuals, families, communities, as a nation. Some time ago, I wrote a short piece about how heterogeneity begets resiliency; it seems relevant to share here.

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Heterogeneity Begets Resiliency

In the wise words of John Muir: When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe. Not only is everything hitched to everything else, but that everything is extremely varied and complex. By design.

Our long-held approach to the world—one where we consider resources to be more valuable when extracted and simplified, where reductionist thinking is regarded as more focused and somehow more powerful, and specialization thought to foster efficiency—is clearly falling apart, producing what seems to be a tsunami of global crises. Crises of climate and weather, fire and brimstone, disease and disassociation. Failures of our individual, collective and planetary minds, bodies, and souls.

Despite it all, this is not that hard. It is we who make it hard. We try to pick out things by themselves. We revere some people and alienate others. We judge some materials treasure, others trash. And, in doing so, we have built a world where monoculture is destroying ecosystems, communities, and our health, while lining the pockets of corporations; where individuals literally die of loneliness and broken hearts when a human hand is right around the bend; where our taste for ease has at best left us longing and adrift, and at worst, anxious and depressed.

If we look to ecosystems, we see a very different story—despite the havoc we are wreaking on all systems. We see marine algae functioning as primary producers—building biomass from carbon and sunlight—to support a web of life that ultimately feeds the great whales. We see fungi building webs between trees of all species in a forest, allowing plants to talk to each other. Through this internet of fungus, they help each other by sharing nutrients and carbon and by warning of impending threats, including pathogens and pests, using chemical signals. We see some organisms using energy produced by plants directly, others eating organisms that ate plants, still others eating organisms that ate organisms that ate plants, and so on in a complex system entirely supported by the sharing of energy produced by plants and microbes. Every single piece of this web matters. Every single piece of this web contributes to its beauty, its capacity, its resiliency.

In a forest, fungi build webs between trees of all species, allowing plants to talk to each other. Through this internet of fungus, trees help each other by sharing nutrients and carbon and by warning of impending threats, including pathogens and pests, using chemical signals.

If we were to follow the lead of nature to focus on reciprocal and regenerative arrangements rather than linear ones in the design of our cities and agricultural systems and communities and relationships, we would be well on the way to healing the ills of the world. As you move about in your world, I encourage you to see it through a systems lens—where you consider a stranger an equal contributor and other species as your sisters and brothers, an expenditure a flow of energy, value, and meaning, the origin and content of the food you eat as important as its taste for—each of these things is hitched to everything else in the universe. If you act from this place, you can’t help but improve your world.

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We each need to determine our personal path forward (see resources below). Nature constant reminds us to be who we are (see: Re-Learning How To Be: Lessons From The Natural World). This is the time to offer up your strengths to the collective. There is a need and space for all of us to contribute our art, our words, our legal acumen, our organizing skills, our fight, our nurturing, our humanitarian offerings. To show up fully with your anger, your tears, your love, your compassion. We need it all.

As you move forward, I invite you consider how you might apply the lessons of nature to nurture resistance and resilience in yourself, your family, your community, and our nation.

Please share your thoughts!

xo, Wendy

Resources

• Robert Reich
  What you can do (revised and expanded).

• Dan Froomkin
  , What you can do to fight the Trump agenda: A list of lists of how to resist.