The current emphasis on sustainable development and ecosystem services promotes the need to better understand long-term ecosystem integrity and ecosystem functioning. This secures long-term provision of ecosystem services and ecosystem conservation. Ecosystem integrity or related notions are referred to in several national and international biodiversity and ecosystem policies that couples ecosystem integrity with human well-being. However, it is still poorly defined. The scientific literature has mobilized an array of terms and notions attempting to conceptualize and describe degrees of ecosystem intactness or alteration. Based on a review of papers proposing ecosystem integrity indicators, we identify five forms of ecosystem integrity which we define their specificities: ecosystem integrity of wilderness, ecosystem functional and structural integrity, ecosystem stability and reliance, ecosystem condition and ecosystem quality and value. These five forms gather into two main strands by the link to conservation ecology or to ecosystem services. Through this clarification, this work provides a platform for more streamlined and comprehensible development of policies and scientific agendas for sustainable development/conservation purposes.

当前对可持续发展和生态系统服务的重视促进了对更好地了解长期生态系统完整性和生态系统功能的需求。这样可以确保长期提供生态系统服务和生态系统保护。在若干国家和国际生物多样性和生态系统政策中提到了生态系统完整性或相关概念，这些政策将生态系统完整性与人类福祉相结合。但是，它仍然定义不清。科学文献动员了一系列术语和概念，试图对生态系统的完整性或变化程度进行概念化和描述。在对提出生态系统完整性指标的论文进行审查的基础上，我们确定了五种形式的生态系统完整性，它们定义了它们的特殊性：旷野的生态系统完整性，生态系统的功能和结构完整性，生态系统的稳定性和依赖性，生态系统的状况以及生态系统的质量和价值。通过与保护生态学或生态系统服务的联系，这五种形式分为两大类。通过澄清，这项工作为更简化和更易于理解的政策和科学议程的发展提供了一个平台，以实现可持续发展/保护的目的。