Total human ecosystem (THE) is an ecocentric concept initially proposed by ecology professors Zeev Naveh and Arthur S. Lieberman in 1994.
[1] Naveh and Lieberman[1] proposed a holistic, ecocentric concept of the total human ecosystem in order to study anthropocene ecology and improve land use planning and environmental management within an integrated and interdisciplinary approach.
In Naveh's words, the total human ecosystem is "the highest co-evolutionary ecological entity on earth with landscapes as its concrete three-dimensional ‘Gestalt’ systems, forming the spatial and functional matrix for all organisms".
[2] Zev Naveh (1919-2011), the major contributor to this concept, was a professor in landscape ecology at the Technion, Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa.
[3] Almo Farina, who also developed the concept from 2000 onwards, is also a professor of ecology at the Urbino University, Faculty of Environmental Sciences, in Italy.