Presents evidence to contradict the assumption of the 'balance of nature'.

Klaus Rohde is Professor Emeritus at the University of New England, Australia.

Introduction; 1. Concepts and problems; 2. Nonequilibrium in communities; 3. Interspecific competition: definition and effects on species; 4. Interspecific competition: effects in communities and conclusion; 5. Non-competitive mechanisms responsible for niche restriction and segregation; 6. Patterns over evolutionary time, present mass-extinctions; 7. Some detailed examples at the population/metapopulation level; 8. Some detailed examples at the community level; 9. Some detailed biogeographical/macroecological patterns; 10. An autecological comparison: the ecology of aspidogastrea; 11. What explains the differences found? A summary, and prospects for an ecology of the future; acknowledgments; References.