ABSTRACT
Evolutionary systems theory can serve as a basis for insight, understanding, and action taken for purposes of stewardship in the Anthropocene. This essay introduces and describes this theory in relation to such stewardship, reviews several of the large-scale complex systems human societies have constructed over the ages, and examines their implications in terms of stewardship today. The main insights pertain to recognition of which of the factors in today’s large-scale complex systems can be changed through stewardship, which cannot, and what interventions appear most apt to go furthest toward preserving, protecting, and passing on the current inherited endowment for future generations.
