A New Ecology: Systems Perspective, Second Edition, gives an overview of the commonalities of all ecosystems from a variety of properties, including physical openness, ontic openness, directionality, connectivity, a complex dynamic for growth and development, and a complex dynamic response to disturbances. Each chapter details basic and characteristic properties that help the reader understand how they can be applied to explain a wide spectrum of current ecological research and environmental management applications.

• Contains revised, updated or redeveloped chapters that include the most current research and technology
• Reviews universal traits of ecosystems from multiple perspectives, giving the reader a complete overview of the systems perspective of ecology
• Offers broad examples of ecology as a systems science, from the history of science, to philosophy and the arts
• Brings together the systems perspective in a framework of four columns for greater understanding, including thermodynamics, network theory, hierarchy theory and biochemistry
• Contains new chapter on the application of the theory to environmental management