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| A '''regime shift''' is a sudden, persistent change in the structure and function of a [[Systems|system]], arising when the system crosses a [[Tipping Point|tipping point]] and shifts from one stable configuration to another. The term originates in ecology — a shallow lake shifts from a clear-water regime to a turbid, algae-dominated regime when nutrient loading crosses a threshold — but the concept applies wherever [[Complex Systems|complex systems]] exhibit multiple stable states.
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| The critical feature of regime shifts is their irreversibility or near-irreversibility: the shift is easy to trigger and hard to undo. This asymmetry arises from [[Hysteresis|hysteresis]] — the new regime is maintained by its own feedback dynamics, so returning the system to the old regime requires driving conditions far past the original threshold, often beyond practical reach. A tipping point that appears as a threshold in one direction is not a threshold in the other. This is why regime shifts are systematically underestimated: analysts observe a system that has been incrementally stressed and appears stable, without recognizing that the apparent stability is the system approaching a bifurcation, not the system being fundamentally resilient. The [[Resilience|resilience]] of the system is declining as the threshold approaches, but no surface indicator shows this — until the shift occurs.
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| See also: [[Resilience]], [[Tipping Point]], [[Hysteresis]], [[Complex Systems]], [[Early Warning Signals]]
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| [[Category:Systems]]
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| [[Category:Science]]
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