In this paper, we identify potential negative social tipping points linked to Earth system destabilization and draw on related research to understand the drivers and likelihood of these negative social tipping dynamics, their potential effects on human societies and the Earth system, and the potential for cascading interactions and contribution to systemic risks.

Tipping points are abrupt, rapid, and sometimes irreversible changes, and numerous approaches have been proposed to detect them in advance. Such approaches have been termed early warning signals and represent a set of methods for identifying changes in the underlying behaviour of a system across time or space that might indicate an approaching tipping point. Here, we review the literature to explore where, how, and which early warnings have been used in real-world case studies so far.

Mathematical models that include interactions between humans and the environment can provide valuable information to further our understanding of tipping points. Many social processes such as social norms and rates of social change can affect these tipping points in ways that are often specific to the system being modeled. Higher complexity of social structure can increase the likelihood of these transitions. We discuss how data are used to predict tipping events across many coupled systems.

We provide an overview of the state and future of Earth system science in Svalbard as a synthesis of the recommendations made by the scientific community active in the archipelago. This work helped identify foci for developments of the observing system and a path forward to reach the full interdisciplinarity needed to operate at Earth system science scale. Better understanding of the processes in Svalbard will benefit both process-level understanding and Earth system models.

Ocean acidification will cause profound shifts in many marine ecosystems by impairing the ability of calcareous taxa to grow and by influencing the photophysiology of many others. Physiological tipping points will likely be reached in the next 20 years. Small changes in organism physiology result in larger ecological tipping points being crossed. Ecosystems will shift from having higher abundances of calcifying taxa and towards increased abundances of non-calcareous species under elevated CO₂.

Lakes worldwide are changing and under threat due to stressors such as overload of nutrients, increased input of organic carbon (“browning”), and climate change, which may cause reduced water volume, salinization, or even loss of waterbodies. Some of these changes are abrupt to the extent that they can be characterized as tipping points for that particular system. Such changes may also cause increased release of greenhouse gases, and lakes are major players in the global climate in this context.

The fast growth in renewables has led to an economic tipping point for the adoption of renewables. This paper reviews how the cost tipping point in renewables can initiate other social tipping dynamics in the energy transition, and it presents energy communities as a promising and fast-growing niche environment that can exploit and foster such tipping dynamics.

Narratives around tipping points, such as the need for positive tipping points in energy transitions to avoid negative Earth system tipping points, do not take into account the entire spectrum of impacts the proposed interventions could have or still rely on narratives that maintain current unsustainable behaviours and marginalize many people. We unpack these ideas in the context of what they mean for the concept of tipping points, using a critical decolonial view from the Global South.

This paper maps out the state-of-the-art literature on interactions between tipping elements relevant for current global warming pathways. We find indications that many of the interactions between tipping elements are destabilizing. This means that tipping cascades cannot be ruled out on centennial to millennial timescales at global warming levels between 1.5 and 2.0 °C or on shorter timescales if global warming surpasses 2.0 °C.