Space and time matter in social-ecological vulnerability assessments

Fostering sustainable local social-ecological interactions playing out against a backdrop of larger-scale dynamics are ubiquitous challenges to natural resource management and biodiversity conservation. Social-ecological vulnerability assessments are highly relevant for place-based management and can help target and prioritize management actions. However, an understanding of how linked social-ecological vulnerabilities respond to external drivers is still lacking. This paper presents an approach that integrates the spatial and temporal dimensions into social-ecological vulnerability assessments, where social and ecological vulnerabilities are linked by a feedback loop. The approach is applied to the Moorea coral reef social-ecological system, which has been significantly influenced by major environmental and social drivers over the last decade. Temporal changes in linked social-ecological vulnerabilities are mapped before and after exposure to the multiple drivers. Nearly 23% of households and 13% of the reef area show low and decreasing vulnerability despite exposure. However, high and increasing levels of vulnerability were detected in 6% of households and associated reefs after exposure to the drivers, providing early warnings of potentially unsustainable situations. Importantly, changes in ecological vulnerability did not propagate linearly to changes in social vulnerability. Similarly, hot spots of social vulnerability were not necessarily associated with hot spots of ecological vulnerability, highlighting the need to specifically adapt management interventions to local social-ecological settings. Mapping social-ecological dependencies in space and time provides communities and decision-makers with the information required to identify and prioritize management interventions while accounting for the effects of large-scale or external drivers.