9.7 The Emergence of Living Systems Thinking in the West
The Western valuation of humans over nature, which dominates today, is known as the anthropocene, and the human-centered thinking it promotes is known as an anthropocentric worldview. Indigenous belief systems have remained earth-centered, or ecocentric, despite colonial efforts to eradicate such thinking. Ecocentric beliefs have likewise existed among Western scientists who questioned the perception of nature as an object to be controlled and tamed. Among these, the botanist Alexandre von Humboldt (1769–1859) reconceptualized the Earth as a living being—not as one filled with the deities of the ancient Greeks, but rather as one with complex, layered, interdependent, dynamic ecosystems with the capacity for ongoing change and renewal.
After traveling through South America and witnessing Spanish mining, Humboldt made a full-throated critique of the devastating environmental and social impact that Spanish colonialism had on South America. In particular, he decried the ravages wrought by colonial mining on both the earth and on the Indigenous peoples who were enslaved to work it. According to the Biodiversity Heritage Library:
Humboldt saw how colonialism destroyed native ecosystems, as colonists had felled so many trees that the land became dry and farming yielded less crops.
While visiting Lake Valencia [in present-day Venezuela], Humboldt first recorded his observation that humans could induce climate change and destroy ecosystems. He noted that when forests are destroyed, springs and riverbeds dry up, the forest floor—no longer protected by tree foliage—becomes oversaturated with rain and soil is loosened, and different types of plants and animal life die. (Byrnes, 2020, paras. 6–7)
In many ways, Humboldt helped pioneer the regenerative worldview that has taken root and spread during the 21st century within tourism—one that conjoins Indigenous traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) with Western science to craft a vision of a transformative system with the capacity to renew and restore the environment. Following Humboldt, Charles Darwin explored the interdependence at the core of the natural realm. Darwin’s On the Origins of Species (1859) led to the recognition of ecology as a field of study.
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In 1869 Ernst Haeckel coined the term “ecology” to designate the study of nature, specifically the study of the relationships between organisms and between organisms and their natural environment. Haeckel’s drawings became so famous during this time that they inspired the art nouveau movement. The architect René Binet modeled the entry gate to the 1900 Paris Exhibition after Haeckel’s drawings of radiolaria—single-celled marine organisms that absorb silica from seawater to build elaborate skeletal structures. As an architect, Binet himself was keenly engaged in biomimicry, the study and replication of designs found in nature. His gates provide an example of biomimicry in architecture decades before the term had even been coined.
[IMAGE OF PARIS GATE]
At the same time that colonial powers divested Indigenous peoples of the lands and worked to eradicate their languages, cultures, traditions, and worldviews, radical Western thinkers such as Humboldt, Darwin, and Haeckel were coming to understand the interdependence of humans and nature and to conceptualize life forms as conjoined in complex, adaptive living systems. Western designers such as the architect Binet also began to practice biomimetics or biomimicry, which involves studying natural systems, designs, and materials in order to solve problems—a practice inherent to Indigenous cultures since time immemorial and a practice increasingly at work in regenerative tourism development.
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Key Takeaway
Although Western thought largely embraced an anthropocentric worldview that separated humans from nature, pioneering scientists like Alexander von Humboldt, Charles Darwin, and Ernst Haeckel developed ideas of ecological interdependence that laid the foundations for modern ecology and living systems thinking.
Significance to Regenerative Tourism
The recognition of ecosystems as dynamic, interconnected, and capable of renewal anticipated today’s regenerative tourism movement, which integrates Indigenous ecological knowledge with Western science to heal and restore degraded environments.
Significance to Tourism
By rooting tourism development in living systems thinking and biomimicry, tourism professionals can design experiences and infrastructures that emulate nature’s balance, fostering resilience, conservation, and community wellbeing instead of extraction and harm.
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Attributions
Human-centered actions and ways of thinking that placing humans above nature in value and treat ecosystems primarily as resources for human use and profit. In tourism, this mindset often leads to development focused on economic growth at the expense of environmental and cultural health. Regenerative tourism seeks to move beyond anthropocentrism, recognizing that human wellbeing is inseparable from healthy ecosystems.
A way of thinking and acting that values nature for its own sake and emphasizes the intrinsic rights of non-human life and ecosystems to exist and thrive. Regenerative tourism adopts an ecocentric view, prioritizing the health and resilience of entire ecological systems.
