LAUSR

This introductory article sets out some issues associated with the concept and theorization of ‘resilience’. We describe some historical contexts in which theories of societal resilience can be usefully deployed; we offer some challenges to critiques of the validity and usefulness of Formal Resilience Theory (Theory of Adaptive Change). Resilience, adaptation, and transformation are complex issues, and while we cannot tell the whole story through the lens of environmental change, we can integrate the various categories of evidence to attempt to focus in on where and how climate change might impact an imperial system. Using an example from Byzantine Anatolia we examine the most vulnerable segments, such as subsistence systems, with respect to the agency of elite managers and the role of religious identity. Thus we can throw light on how interconnected environmental and social factors might exert pressure on other sub-systems and thus the system as a whole.