In a period when the prospect of total climate change and the risks of rising temperatures and drought in certain areas are becoming specific, the management of desert areas becomes urgent. Desertification is a particularly complex phenomenon and, as is evident from reading the texts of this volume, there are close ties and multiple interactions between climate, geodynamic, biological, and human factors that contribute to the occurrence of the phenomenon. But it is also difficult to define and record. For the local populations of farmers and herders living in declining demographic areas, expressions such as "the place is ruined" or "the place has gone wild" imply the perspective of the local community, which experiences the event as social desertification and retreat of local culture in the face of the wild nature.

The publication of this volume is a conscious choice of monodisciplinary work. The different perspectives in approaching desertification, as a typical product of social and natural relations, offer a wealth of views and force individual analyses to open up and be constantly questioned. The texts included in the volume allow readers to discover where the analyses of authors from different scientific cultures intersect and where they differ. In an era of constant questioning of scientific certainties and the rise of relativism, the ability to present multiple and different but equivalent interpretations offers a new dynamic for the study of desertification.