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This book [2 vol.] considers the principle of 'sustainable development' which is currently facing a growing environmental crisis. A new mode of thinking and positioning the ecological imperative is the major input of this volume. The prism of co-viability is not the economics of political agencies that carry the ideology of the dominant/conventional economic schools, but rather an opening of innovation perspectives through science. This volume, through its four parts, more than 40 chapters and a hundred authors, gives birth to a paradigm which crystallizes within a concept that will support in overcoming the ecological emergency deadlock.

This second volume is the work of more than 55 authors from 15 different disciplines and includes complex systems science which studies the viability of components, and also the study of empirical situations. As readers will discover, the coviability of social and ecological systems is based on the contradiction between humanity, which adopts finalized objectives, and the biosphere, which refers to a ecological functions. We see how concrete situations shed light on the coviability's determinants, and in this book the very nature of the coviability, presented as a concept-paradigm, is defined in a transversal and ontological ways. By adopting a systemic approach, without advocating any economic dogma (such as development) or dichotomizing between humans and nature, while emphasizing what is relevant to humans and what is not, this work neutrally contextualizes man's place in the biosphere. It offers a new mode of thinking and positioning of the ecological imperative, and will appeal to all those working with social and ecological systems.

National (State) and international environmental law is based on a scientific dimension that places man at the heart of a normative system founded on a naturalist rationale. However, the dichotomy enacted between societies and ecosystems is questioned by the idea that humankind is part of nature (Stockholm Declaration, 1972; World Charter for Nature 1982), and by the fact that nature is part of a cultural construction (Descola P, Par delà nature et culture. Gallimard, Paris, 2005) leading to the concept of an anthroposystem (Lévêque C, Muxart T, Abbadie L, Weil A, Van der Leeuw S, L'anthroposystème: entité structurelle et fonctionnelle des interactions sociétés-milieux. In: Lévêque C, Van der Leeuw (dir) Quelles natures voulons-nous? pour une approche socio-écologique du champ de l'environnement. Elsevier, Paris, pp 110–129, 2003). The ecological imperative (pressing ecological needs), defined by climate change and biodiversity degradation, raises questions about the desirability of an anthropocentric environmental law, subjected to a neoliberal economic paradigm (we take here the example of French law). Furthermore, this law the vocation of which is to provide a response to the urgent ecological situation, is based on a technical dimension, obliterating the anthropological dimension of human diversity. The ensuing challenge consists of integrating an anthropological dimension to environmental law which is based essentially only on an ecological dimension in an anthropocentric manner, by being open to legal pluralism through accepting a “legal endogeneity” (i.e. law developed by the social body).

Fishery sector viability is usually considered as the combined viability of ecological, technical, social and/or economic subsystems considered as related subparts. This study examines this global viability at a lower level, i.e., as a result of the combination of idiosyncratic traits and activities of heterogeneous agents at the individual level. A multi-agent simulation model of the small-scale fishery sector in Senegal is presented to explore this approach. The aim of the study is to formalize diverse interaction sets between agents at the near individual level (communities) and evaluate their effect on the overall function and possible coordination of the fishery sector. Diverse sets of fishermen, traders, boats, trucks, consumers, fishing zones, markets, landing sites and fish products are formalized based on observations reported from the real sector. The model produces contrasted patterns and histories from one place (port, market) to another. Simulations show that at the integrated level, the fishery system may reach a homeostatic state by itself, where production, wealth, working population size and activity are stable and optimally organized (four indicators are presented in this respect). The homeostatic, steady regime of the simulated system can be deteriorated (e.g., when removing the entry/exit of working communities). The overall viability obtained by simulation is discussed. The role of self-adaptation, diversity, and history in the synchronization and good function of the integrated fishery system is highlighted.

Environmental law, whose purpose is to respond to the ecological urgency, is based on technical aspects, i.e. legal; obliterating the anthropological aspects of human diversity. It is from the assumption of an interweaved society-environment viability within the biosphere, that the legal approach can be revisited and re-established based on the adequacy of (social) usefulness to an (ecological) function, based on field studies. The adoption of a paradigm based on an approach of social viability within the Earth system, i.e. coviability, has resulted in a socio-ecological link being highlight and which needs to be formalized in legal regulation by though an adequacy between human needs and the ecological function.

International audience; This introductory chapter delineates the challenge of formalizing a concept-paradigm and provides specific examples that could be considered as models of socio-ecological viability. We investigate the benefits that the concept of coviability brings to the concept of "sustainable development". Contributions will be given throughout the book and will be summarized in a final chapter, which will define the concept-paradigm through a transdisciplinary approach.

Vol. 2: Coviability Questioned by a Diversity of Situations Chapitre 40 La version en français sera publiée ultérieurement aux éditions Matériologiques en co-édition avec les éditions IRD; International audience; The babassu palm tree (Attalea speciosa Mart. ex Spreng.) is a species native to the Amazonian rainforest. The invasive nature of this palm tree results in a high density of babassu palm trees with a subsequent decrease in forage crop production. This is a serious problem for local farmers who have tried to resolve it by removing mature palms, seedlings and young individuals. Within these conditions, is coviability between the babassu palm tree and society possible? Our work consisted in developing tools and methods with the aim of producing knowledge and providing answers to this issue within a given territory. To understand the eco-socio-system, we have explored the available knowledge in the literature, produced specific field data, tools and methods such as mathematical modeling (dynamics of the palm tree population) and remote sensing (land use analysis thanks to Landsat high-resolution images and automatic detection of mature palm trees using Pleiades and GeoEye very high-resolution images). This multidisciplinary research in progress has already given us a good overview of the current situation of this eco-socio-system, enabling us to consider the best way to ensure its sustainability.

Climate change, detected in the 1980s, is upsetting the status quo. Its causes, like those of the acidification of the ocean or the loss of biodiversity, are rooted in the way in which humans live and consume since 1950. To safeguard the common future of humanity and ecological systems, the window for taking action is a few decades. Efforts exist, such as those associated with the COP21 in 2015, but their extent remains unambitious given the urgency and stakes. This chapter explores, through a literature review, the brakes and drivers of coviability (respect for others, whether human or non-human, in a relationship of interdependence). The brakes appear rooted in societal references prevalent in the world of today and are the values of sceptics and of those who organize deliberately the doubt. Their roots lie in the interweaved development of capitalism, science and religion in the West and the advent here below of a modernity that would be the expression on earth of a supreme order truth. The identified levers of coviability are multiple: the individual (he develops mainly by exchanging with others); Legislative (climate justice and the legal framing of firms regarding their missions of public interest are under development) or Policy (developing countries are making efforts and have other histories and references). Adding delegations of vital entities, such as atmosphere, land, ocean, biodiversity and coviability, to nation State delegations is a proposition to strengthen the political component.

This chapter is part of a critical debate on the concept of ecosystem service. Since the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, ecosystem services are seen as the key component of the relationship between nature (ecosystems) and human beings (sociosystems). We assume that this perspective is partly wrong. Ecosystems services are not always provided in a sustainable way. In order to bridge nature and human beings and to reach comprehensive coviability, a feedback loop is required between ecosystem and sociosystem services. The first part is dedicated to a critical presentation of ecosystem services definitions and their input to the viability of human societies. The second part focuses on the identification and the classification of ecosystem services attached to the reef environment of the Reunion Island. The third part focuses on the concept of sociosystem services whose four main types are: the 'sanctuary of habitats' service, the ecological engineering service, the service of 'reduction of the anthropogenic pressure on ecosystems', and the reduction of pollution service.

Protected areas (PA) are a central element of Human/Nature coviability. During the last twenty years, their number has increased dramatically and new, diverse objectives have been set. This diversification is accompanied by an increase in the lack of effectiveness on the conservation of biodiversity and endangered species. The financial shortages and the low social acceptability can also heavily impact the functioning of many PAs Faced with the increasing risk of “paper parks”, this chapter shows that governance of PAs is a critical tool for sustaining this aspect of human/nature coviability. Governance of PAs is proper to a decision-making process and deals with the management of information flow and the monitoring of actions. In the first part, the concept of environmental governance applied to PAs is specified. In the second part, governance is taken as a decision-making process, through the management of information flows. This approach is detailed in a third section. The PAs steering and control module and the social acceptance of PAs are introduced as a central element of their governance.

Our main objective is to elicit (The act of helping experts in constructing their knowledge to allow them to saved/shared) the notions of coviability, viability and perenniality, as they address man's relationship with his environment. The analysis focuses on the Society-Environment relationship, and is based on a systemic approach. This leads us to consider "System Earth" as a whole when the following crucial question is asked: how can we ensure the perenniality of this relationship while also respecting equity for and between peoples? As is the case for knowledge representation and reasoning, we use the notion of "angle" (semantic relativism) in order to better perceive and describe the main concepts and relationships that reside in this complex system. By adopting an angle on a system, a compartment is extracted, which is easier to analyze. It is through this compartmentalization that we base the reasoning about the perenniality of the Society-Environment relationship and the viability of "System Earth." We demonstrate that the term coviability used to relate the Society-Environment relationship, and deriving from a vision of Man vs Nature, is neither a systemic (nor holistic) vision. Other than at the global level, we believe that it is a mistake to take this term as a marker for decision-making and action. The compartmentalization protocol and its accompanying tools are commented upon and illustrated in two cases: the "Ecosystemic Service" angle and the "Territorial" angle. In the course of our study, we put forward a coherent set of concepts and relationships by adopting a systemic approach, which enriches our understanding of "System Earth" and of its viability. We also adopt an approach by compartmentalization that focuses on the “Organizational Function” that Society endows itself with, including that of managing the Society-Environment relationship.

Is there a sense, or a legitimacy, to viewing biodiversity conservation within the terms of coviability? And in this case, what are the long-term objectives that we could establish, and what are the obstacles that face us? Some researchers believe that nature must be "free from any human activity". Such an objective requires getting rid of facilities in order to return to naturalness, which implies drastic changes on an economic level. However, this scenario excludes man as an environmental player making it very difficult to consider coviability in these conditions... Conversely, others believe that biodiversity, in Europe at least, is the product of interactions between spontaneous ecological processes and human activities through the use of natural resources. Most of our supposedly natural systems are actually manmade systems, systems that are managed for particular services. Therefore, one wonders what will become these systems when we abandon certain usages or when the climate changes. Past landscapes may stir a feeling of nostalgia in us, but in this context the real question is what kind of nature do we desire? Which goals do we set for ourselves? We could think of a sustained and landscaped nature in which no nuisances would be allowed! Preserving biodiversity manifests itself through the demonstration that it is useful to humankind, and not through exclusive gestures. Coviability paths are therefore vague when it comes to biodiversity protection, so they require compromises and permanent adjustments between ecological and social systems. In reality, it is neither about imposing one's law on nature nor about liberating it from humankind. Rather, coviability aims at assisting and guiding the trajectory of ecological systems in the direction desired by society without excess and without complacency.

Today civil society have new expectations: scientists must not only measure risks and suggest solutions of mitigation or adaptation, but they also have to monitor and report changes in order to facilitate public decision. Reporting global change nowadays is based on indicators. The main challenge is to find synthetic, and valid indicators for time and space scales relevant to challenges and to mitigation and adaptation policies. Simultaneously, Earth observation has largely evolved. The number of spatial missions has drastically increased, and today we have relatively continuous data in space and in time. This remote sensing evolution causes a shift of paradigm. The richness of data, and the fact that they now cover a wide range of resolutions and temporal frequency, make a "bottom up" approach possible, which develops from the observations to construct a stochastic approach of the environmental and social dynamics at work. This chapter will attempt to give some examples of holistic indicators of changes in the fields of global water resources and biodiversity loss, provoked by human impacts on the Amazonian agricultural frontier. These themes mobilize the concept of coviability between societies and their environment.

Climate change constitutes a new threat to the sustainability of coral ecosystems. The vulnerability of a coral ecosystem to climate-related hazards can greatly increase when it suffers from chronic anthropogenic disturbances (wastewater discharges, eutrophication). These indeed reduce the ability of coral reefs to withstand these hazards (resistance) and their potential to recover their initial condition (resilience) in case of very impacting hazards. Therefore, there is a risk of an amplifier feedback loop snapping in place with an endpoint of a crippling loss of resilience of coral formations and eventually the disappearance of most of them. Reducing such an amplifier feedback loop should be one of the main objectives of the coral coastal management in order to build new human/coral reef societies coviability to face climate change. Reconsidering the strategies of the creation of marine protected areas fits into this framework. This requires a focus on reef connectivity, resistance and resilience of species and species assemblages.

International audience; The concepts for a mathematical approach to coviability, deriving from Aubin's viability theory, as a generalisation of control theory, are introduced and examplified.

The oases of Northern Africa, rich and complex but also fragile, have lasted for centuries and thus demonstrated their longevity. Today, how can we position their future in a context of significant environmental and social change? In order to address the notions of viability and coviability, it is necessary to verify the study's systemic context. The hypothesis that an oasis system exists has thereby been tested and the analytical inferences discussed. It uses the systemic approach and relies on reasoning by compartmentalization which is useful in the case of complex systems. Through a dual compartment/system vision, it is possible to address the trajectory of the North African oases, presented here as territorial compartments, to discuss their systemic coherence and thus question their future. This work illustrates a generic approach in order to understand the society-environment relationship. It provides the suitable systemic level for governance targeting systemic viability and coviability.

The notion of coviability, which highlights the interdependence that exists between every system and its environment, is applied here to tourism systems at a territorial scale (territorialized tourism systems, TTS). TTS correspond to territorial systems whose dominant feature is touristic or recreational (which raises the question of their degree of specialization). Such systems can be described as articulated around a core system that is itself structured around tourism activities, in close interaction with an encompassing tourism system at a different scale (region, state, world, etc.), as well as with an intra-territorial environment conditioned by geophysical and ecological processes, on the one hand, and by other socio-spatial functions (agriculture, livestock farming, industry, residentiality, etc.), on the other. Since it is a medium of interpretation of the territory, a TTS does not directly include the totality of the territory's features, and it should not be confused with the sole sub-system of tourism activities in the strictest sense of the term. The question of its viability leads us to explore a dual form of coviability, which is both intra-territorial (having a potential for synergy and coherence of relationships with other sub-systems identifiable within the territory), and extra-territorial (dependence on the touristic meta-system and on fluctuations in its environment). Numerous case studies linked to ongoing research, mainly concerning mountain areas, are taken to illustrate this dual coviability and explain the factors that influence the time lags between the changes in tourist modalities and those of other territorial modalities.

Ethnoecology attempts to understand how societies interact with their environment by focusing in particular on the processes of ecological knowledge constructions. These processes are part of a particular socio-cultural context, and they are the result of numerous interactions with non-human elements of the environment such as animals, plants, landscapes, artifacts, and so on. Local knowledge, as it is often called, is constantly renewed through daily relations. It constitutes a privileged indicator of environmental changes, and it allows societies to adjust their behavior within ecological and socio-cultural frameworks, which are more or less restrictive but relatively dynamic. Studying ecological knowledge, its dynamism, and the dynamism and implementation of the ecological and socio-cultural frameworks assist in sketching coviability models. The latter are considered as temporary and renewed adjustments of societies and their environment, adjustments that do not compromise the sustainability of their relationship and which emanate essentially from negotiation processes.

Coviability of Social and Ecological Systems: Reconnecting Mankind to the Biosphere in an Era of Global Change comprises two volumes and forty-three chapters totaling about 900 pages. The book is prefaced by an economist and concluded by an ecologist; its postscript is written by a socio-anthropologist. A hundred researchers, belonging to more than twenty disciplines, contributed to its development; and this under the direction, in full interdisciplinarity, of twelve co-editors. Before closing the book, it is necessary to clarify the main point, rather than offer an inaccessible summary. At this stage, it is important to identify the significance of this scientific paradigm of coviability, especially in an international context confronted with an ecological imperative. The book seeks to draw from the set of works an initial definition of the paradigm of coviability. This goal's point of departure is the plural definitions and disciplines, the heterogeneous works giving space for reflection. This new paradigm of socio-ecological coviability offers an ecological transition promoted at the global, national and local scales. An integrative paradigm is suggested to counter the dominant naturalistic paradigm. The goal of this paradigm is "living in harmony with nature," that is, creating harmony between humans and nonhumans. The challenge consists of breaking free from a reductive anthropocentrism in order to integrate an ontology open to a socio-ecological dimension, with the goal of reconnecting humanity to the biosphere. The diversity of the situations approached by the different research teams makes it possible to test a definition of socio-ecological coviability that may be: a property of interactive dependence between humans and nonhumans joined in a relationship that is contained by regulations and constraints. This relationship establishes a link of viability subjected to an integration threshold of the complex human/nonhuman system determining the limits of coviability's elasticity, whose realization remains the coevolution in an integrated socio-ecological system. The legal and political formalization of the coviability paradigm is designed to contribute to the ecological transition by establishing a new general Principle that could reposition the goal of sustainable development in terms of viability.

One critical concern for Thailand reservoirs which are used for irrigated agriculture (mainly paddy rice) and aquaculture is the lack of information on contamination from trace metal element (TME) in waters and biological compartments of the reservoirs. TME are both from natural and anthropogenic origins and may affect the quality of lake waters and food chain. The goal of this study was to evaluate the contamination in TME and study their transfer between the different compartments in and downstream of the reservoir. Fourteen TME have been measured in water column (dissolved phase), fishes, and sediments of the Mae Thang Reservoir (northern Thailand) as well as soil and rice grains of irrigated area. Analyses were performed by inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometer (ICP-MS). This 2-year study showed that TME concentrations in water were lower than standards for irrigation and aquatic life. However, localized values of Fe and Mn were higher than the standard in the bottom of the reservoir in dry season. TME in sediments were relatively high compared to pristine lakes. Two species of fish were contaminated in As and Ni. Soils exceeded standard values for Cr, Ni, and Cu, while rice grains showed contamination in Ni that indicated a transfer between soil and rice grain. The accumulation of TME in sediments showed that upstream cultivated areas may have contributed to bring TME in the reservoir. TME concentrations in fishes were thus affected and should be controlled. Accumulation of TME in soils of paddy field due to the use of pesticides and fertilizer may increase contamination of rice in the long term.

Chinese classics of medicine and medical records abound in reference to epidemic febrile diseases. Along with famine due to crop failures, droughts, floods and wars, they exerted a heavy burden on Chinese populations throughout the ages. The early classics of medicine (e.g. Huang Di Nei Jing, Nan Jing, Shang Han Lun, about 200 B.C.-220 A.D.) credited epidemic diseases to the invasion of the body by pathogenic cold and wind, classing them into the category of "cold damage disorders". With the creation of the "School of Warm Diseases" (Qing Dynasty, 1644-1911), a new conception of epidemic diseases emerged: distinction between "warm diseases" and "cold damage disorders", role of a warm "epidemic (or pestilential) qi" or "epidemic toxin" in their occurrence, body invasion through the mouth and nose, high contagiousness, specificity of the epidemic qi according to the species (human or animal) and the nature of the epidemic disease, favouring role of severe climatic and environmental conditions in their emergence, etc. This paper reviews the evolution of medical perceptions on epidemic diseases through Chinese classics of medicine. It stresses the importance of the growing awareness of variations in local and regional environments (with their climatic, epidemiological and medical specificities) in the refashioning of discourses and practices relative to epidemic diseases in Chinese medicine.

International audience; Understanding and measuring the consequences of environmental pollution on human health remains a challenge. Several barriers arise, with the difficulty in identifying uncommon pathologies but also with the limited knowledge of the real health status of populations that depends on the supply and use of care. In an effort to assess these barriers, we chose a study area severely affected by agricultural intensification to investigate the potential and visible impact of water pollution on human health. Located in northern Thailand, the study area includes a watershed, its reservoir and the irrigated area downstream. A questionnaire-based survey was conducted to assess the exposure of 297 households to potential water pollutions and understand their behaviour regarding the use of water and recourse to health services. The observations are discussed in the light of the epidemiological records provided by the Ministry of Public Health for the same area. The study shows the heterogeneity of the epidemiological data and the difficulty to assess the sanitary risk. Despite the small size of the study area, inequalities are observed, with remote populations having a poorer access to water with occasional shortage and a limited use of health services. In this context, the intensification of agriculture and the massive use of pesticides and fertilizers are likely to have serious consequences on human health. However, the impact of potential environmental pollution is not visible from the epidemiological records, because of a difficult diagnosis, a lack of consultation when symptoms are reversible and the long latency before clinical symptoms are apparent (example of cancers). Prevention and incentive from health authorities should help in reducing this risk.