Abstract for: Leveraging Systems Thinking and Modeling to Tackle Global Development Challenges

Global development challenges such as food security, climate change, and access to critical services are complex and dynamic issues with emergent outcomes that are driven by a myriad of interconnected multidimensional factors. The complex nature of these issues means that they are difficult to influence, resulting in slow or backsliding progress on critical global development indicators. System dynamics (SD) approaches are uniquely suited to exploring factors and dynamics driving global challenges and identifying potential areas of impact and policy to leverage large-scale change. However, these issues are often difficult to model given a general lack of quantitative and dynamic data at the local and regional level, where much decision making on development programming occurs. In this practitioner application presentation, we introduce a framework we have been developing over the past ten years to build semi-quantitative models of entrenched global challenges including rural water sustainability, food security, and deforestation, using the mental models of local stakeholders. We have learned a great deal through these efforts, and welcome a hearty and productive discussion among peers for how to improve the application of systems thinking and modeling to better understand the root causes of complex global development challenges.