* Corresponding Author: [email protected]
1 School of Informatics, Computing and Cyber Systems, Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff, AZ, USA
2 Department of Environmental Science, Baylor University, Waco, TX, USA
Citation: Sjöstedt, E., Fowler, K., Rushforth, R., McManamay, R., Ruddell, B. 2025. Sustainability and resilience through connection: the economic metacommunities of the Western USA. Ecology and Society, 30(1):4. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-15676-300104
Abstract: Regional social, environmental, and economic systems form a rich web of connections that both create opportunities and pose risks. Regional economies, characterized by their interconnectedness across jurisdictional boundaries, might be better managed at a transboundary scale since they can leverage a broad resource pool and greater economic diversity compared to a single jurisdiction alone. The technical challenge is to identify which economies are connected and could be managed collectively to better mitigate, absorb, and recover from disruptions. Economic risk management often occurs at the state level, but network approaches can identify groups that interact with one another based on actual commodity flows, capturing important features of the system that are not currently coordinated. One such approach, based on ecological theory, is to identify economic metacommunities. This paper uses theories and methods from metacommunity ecology to identify overarching structures in the Western U.S. trade network. Specifically, we construct commodity flow networks for 25 metro and rural areas, then assess these using the ecological concepts of interaction strength, diversity, clusters, and sources and sinks to identify 5 economic metacommunities. Based on metacommunity membership, we answer the question: Which regions in the Western USA are interdependent, and are interdependent regions spatially proximate or not? These results are useful in economic development and infrastructure planning for developing redundancy, targeting vulnerable interdependencies, and understanding potential risks from adverse policy exposure.
Keywords: Metacommunities; Regional Economies; Trade Networks; Network Modularity
Acknowledgements: The authors thank Isaac Shaffer of the Northern Arizona University School of Informatics, Computing and Cyber Systems, Kendall Smith and Sean Koenig of the Northern Arizona University Complex Systems Informatics Lab, Dr. Clare Aslan of the Northern Arizona University Center for Adaptable Western Landscapes, and Dr. Laljeet Sangha of the University of California Agriculture and Natural Resource Extension for their time and contributions in reviewing the manuscript. The authors also thank Dr. Wesley Ingwersen of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Office of Research and Development and the Center for Environmental Solutions and Emergency Response for assistance in obtaining the EPA multi- regional input-output economic data tables.
E.C.S., K.F.F., and R.R.R. acknowledge support from the National Science Foundation Grant No. CBET- 2115169 (‘SRS RN: Transforming Rural-Urban Systems: Trajectories for Sustainability in the Intermountain West’). K.F.F acknowledges support from the National Science Foundation Research Traineeship Award ID 1829075 (‘NRT-HDR: A team-based training paradigm integrating informatics and ecology’). R.A.M acknowledges support from the National Science Foundation, Humans, Disasters, and the Built Environment Grant (HDBE) PD 19-1638. CMMI Research and Development Award ID 2241213. B.L.R acknowledges support from USDA NIFA AFRI award 2018-69011-28369 (‘Evaluating Alternative Water Institution Performance in Snow-Dominated Basin: Are Food Productions Systems at Risk from Changing Snow Water Availability?’).