Quantifying socio‐economic novelty in fisheries social‐ecological systems

Abstract Socio‐economic development has shaped fisheries social‐ecological systems (SES) worldwide across different scales. No work yet undertaken how this led to novel, not experienced before, structure in marine SES. Here, we quantify socio‐economic novelty as the degree of dissimilarity relative a specific spatiotemporal baseline Baltic Sea SES between 1975 and 2015. We used catch by "gears," "commercial groups" trade ("import" "export") respective indicators at national, regional international governance levels. found that increased over time nonlinearly relation 1975–1979 baseline. The contribution total shifted from dominance “gears” “commercial groups” late 1990s early 2000s “import” “export” after mid‐2000s, i.e. national levels level. fastest increase occurred with shift, primarily related monetary value rather than quantity. Spatially, emerged large difference countries, major Sweden, Denmark Poland. identified influence management interventions actions on emergence decreasing could indicate reduced variability due intervention recent years which might decrease resilience shocks. Calculating studying its drivers scales provide better understanding complexity inform urgently needed adaptation transformation towards sustainable future pathways.