“If communities work on reducing the risk factors and investing in protective factors, they will not only be more likely to recover from crises faster but will also have the opportunity to grow from them and thrive in a new way.”

[Jacob Bornstein and Mesa Sebree].

Many historians believe that we are now living in the best period of human history. We live longer, have a higher average income, eat better, and are more educated. However, many of us wake up each morning feeling burdened by the current or impending calamities of our day. Climate change, threats to global democracies, conflicts, a widening income gap, stark inequities in health and well-being, mass extinctions, and mass migration— the list goes on.

Polycrisis: What is it?

1. The United Nations Environment Programme defines “polycrisis” as the interaction of numerous crises across global systems that have a considerable negative impact on planetary health and human well-being.
2. The Cascade Institute provides a more thorough definition:

A global polycrisis arises when crises in many global systems become causally linked, drastically reducing humanity’s prospects. These interlocking crises do more harm than the sum of the crises’ individual effects if their host systems were not so intertwined.

Description of the current polycrisis.

Allow us to digest some of the harsh facts we are currently facing. Human-caused global warming poses an existential threat to humanity by increasing the frequency and intensity of heatwaves, droughts, wildfires, heavy precipitation, and tropical cyclones, putting 3.3 to 3.6 billion people in climate-vulnerable situations and threatening ecosystems (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, 2023). The World Bank projects that there will be around 216 million internal climate migrants by 2050 (Clement et al., 2021), while the global economy is expected to lose $23 trillion by 2050 (Flavelle, 2021). Think about Russia’s aggressiveness against Ukraine. Headlines like “Wider war in Europe ‘no longer a fantasy'” (Foy, 2024) raise concerns among the European population about a war in Europe (Hajek, Kretzler & Konig, 2023). Finally, dangers to democracy around the world are on the rise, often as a result of failing economic systems and accompanied by attacks on free speech (especially on campuses), independent media, and the right to peaceful protest (e.g., Roth, 2025). The convergence of these crises has been described as a global polycrisis, or “the causal entanglement of crises in multiple global systems in ways that significantly degrade humanity’s prospects” (Lawrence, Homer-Dixon, Janzwood, Rockstom, Renn & Donges, 2024: 2). Surprisingly, while international collaboration is urgently required to address the current polycrisis, populist politicians set off nationalist political agendas that stymie international collaboration. Even worse, the devastating repercussions of climate change may inspire a “resource-heavy, escapist consumption” among populist politicians and their supporters “while [they] still can” (Beckett, 2025), hastening the crises.

However, upon reflection, we can observe that humanity has demonstrated remarkable resilience and adaptability in the face of both past and current disasters. Volcanic eruptions, pandemics, wars, and genocides are the historical catastrophes that have caused the most human injury and suffering, dating back to the bubonic plague and World War II. Despite massive losses, with up to 90% of populations dying, communities have shown resilience. Recent crises related to war, natural disasters, and economic downturns have also demonstrated various degrees of recovery, impacted by factors such as effective governance and economic diversification. Understanding past events can help us put the current crises into context. They remind us that regardless of what we confront, the world will survive, mankind will triumph, and the problems we face will compel us to create new ways to live and work that will eventually restore balance for people and the planet. Finally, humanity’s ability to withstand and rebuild provides lessons and hope for how we might prepare for and overcome the polycrisis that lies ahead.

Protective aspects for societal resilience.

The key subject of this article is how civilisations and communities may recover in the face of catastrophic events that are unavoidable, such as climate change, sickness, economic collapse, or war. While future crises will surely occur at both the global and local levels, communities may take essential activities to assist them adapt and recover from crises: (a) Invest in the community’s civic capacity; (b) Ensure leaders are elected fairly and accountable to the public; and (c) Determine community weaknesses and work collaboratively with the community to solve them, whether they are diversifying the economy, reducing the risk of natural disasters, building better relationships with neighbouring communities or countries, supporting local communication and information systems, improving the educational system, or ensuring basic human rights. These issues are generally too large for a single government organisation, industry, or foundation to address. They demand the community’s collaborative effort and wisdom.

These techniques will only succeed if we approach each day honestly and with mutual respect, rather than using gamesmanship for power. That means we must wake up each day determined to participate meaningfully— with whomever, whenever, and wherever we can. We must concentrate on transforming the world into a better place, starting from the foundation. To do so, we must honestly appraise the situation before us. Blaming others for denying chances or committing previous wrongs will not result in long-term rewards, nor will shifting responsibility to other, “larger” players. The worldwide polycrisis will surely affect everyone on the planet. We all have a role to play in the struggle to ensure that our families, communities, and nations can resist the pressures and evolve into something greater along the way.

Our social fabric may be frayed and torn, but it is stronger than any threat that could attempt to divide us. History demonstrates that humanity has often recovered from even the most severe tragedies. Humans are resilient; when we come together with a common goal for a better society, there is nothing we cannot overcome. We hope that using these tools, we can build a ladder of hope in our everyday lives. We can overcome profound divisions and collaborate to address the difficulties we face today and in the future. In a community prepared to face and adapt to our darkest days, we can live our daily lives without hypocrisy. We can sense the need to connect, to look that person in the eye who appears so different from us and share a smile, and perhaps even to phone a friend or loved one because we have the mental space to express some hope.

A Call to Action.

It is critical to recognise that maintaining hope in the face of the unfolding polycrisis is becoming increasingly difficult for individuals in society. However, hope appears to be increasingly important if students, educators, and administrators are to find ways to deal with the polycrisis in ways that shift decision-making towards and for planetary health (Colombo et al., 2024; Edwards & Küpers, 2024; Hedlund, Esbjörn-Hargens, Hartwig, & Bhaskar, 2025). The literature on hope also recognises this basic contradiction: for example, holding on to hope in difficult times is critical to our survival—if we act. On the other side, giving up hope during difficult times can jeopardise our survival if we do not act (for example, when we believe something or someone will suddenly come to our rescue). There are significant consequences for management learning, management education, and the effectiveness of business schools.

References

Beckett, A. 2025. February 1: In Trump’s fantasy politics, he can accomplish anything—but reality will prevail. Guardian.

Clement, V., Rigaud, K. K., de Sherbinin, A., Jones, B., Adamo, S., Schewe, J., Sadiq, N., & Shabahat, E. 2021. Groundswell part 2: Acting on internal climate migration. Washington, DC: World Bank.

Colombo, L., Moser, C., Muehlfeld, K., & Joy, S. 2024. Sowing the seeds of change: Calling for a social-ecological approach to management learning and education. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 23: 207–213.

Edwards, M. G. & Küpers, W. 2024. Feelings for the planet: An alternative vocabulary for incorporating biosphere-focused emotions into management learning and education. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 23: 600–625.

Flavelle, C. 2021. April 22: Climate change could cut world economy by $23 trillion in 2050, insurance giant warns. New York Times.

Foy, H. 2024. April 9: Wider war in Europe ‘no longer a fantasy’, warns EU’s top diplomat. Financial Times.

Hajek, A., Kretzler, B., & Konig, H.-H. 2023. Fear of war in Germany: An observational study. Heliyon, 9: e21784.

Hedlund, N., Esbjörn-Hargens, S., Hartwig, M., & Bhaskar, R. 2015. Introduction: On the deep need for integrative metatheory in the 21st century. In R. BhaskarS. Esbjörn-HargensN. HedlundM. Hartwig (Eds.), Metatheory for the twenty-first century: Critical realism and integral theory in dialogue: 1–34. London: Routledge.

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. 2023. Summary for policymakers. In H. Lee & J. Romero (Eds.), Climate change 2023: Synthesis report— Contribution of working groups I, II and III to the sixth assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change: 1–34. Geneva, Switzerland: Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Lawrence, M., Homer-Dixon, T., Janzwood, S., Rockstom, J., Renn, O., & Donges, J. F. 2024. Global polycrisis: The causal mechanisms of crisis entanglement. Global Sustainability, 7: e6.

Lindebaum, D. 2024. Management learning and education as “big picture” social science. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 23: 1–7.

Roth, K. 2025, February 21: How do we defend free speech— without falling prey to extremism? Guardian.