###### Abstract
Currently, the resilience concept is explored for diverse uses and applications in natural science. This study is hinged on the evolution of resilience from a purely ecological perspective to that of complex systems analysis [9]. Until the dawn of ecological resilience studies, it was conceived as the capacity to confront, absorb and adapt to disturbances, without changing, to return to a state of normality [10; 11]. Within the engineering space, the amount of time it would take a system or an object to return to that state of normality is evaluated as resilience [12]. However, the socioecological system context challenged the idea of normality, adopting an understanding of multiple equilibriums and accepting the inevitability of change [7; 9; 13]. It has been proposed that resilience is a system's adaptation based on learning, planning and reorganisation to preserve function, structure and identity [14]. Resilience to climate change is an important factor because it measures the capacity of social-ecological systems (SES) to absorb recurrent disturbances to retain essential structures, processes and feedbacks [15; 16]. Resilience is classified into buffer capacity, adaptive capacity and self-organisation in this study [17]. A key element is a feedback mechanism, which enables farmers to receive signals, process and interpret them, and respond with adequate changes in their management practices [8]. The environmental and anthropogenic stressors within the cocoa agroecosystem emphasise the need to improve the adaptive capacity of farmers. This can be achieved through learning to live with change and uncertainty; nurturing diversity for resilience; combining different types of knowledge about complex systems; and creating opportunities for the sustainable management of the social-ecological system [18]. In this study, resilience is referred to as the ability of a cocoa agroecosystem to absorb disturbance and retain its basic functions and structure [11]. It would therefore be able to deliver outputs in the form of goods and services for the benefit of humanity. The shaded and full-sun cultivation systems are different cocoa production systems in Ghana that differ in structure, composition and management style. Studies on the factors that promote or undermine the resilience of cocoa production systems to anthropogenic and environmental stressors are critical to the course of sustainability. In the absence of a methodological framework that considers resilience from a system's perspective, cocoa farmers seemingly carry out all kinds of practices in an attempt to alleviate the shocks. These sometimes result in maladaptation, and the cost to cocoa farmers is enormous. Previous studies on cocoa agroecosystem resilience to climate change in Ghana did not expatiate on the three dimensions of resilience. This should be a cause for concern to stakeholders in the cocoa industry, given the contribution of cocoa to economic growth, the need to improve resilience and the goal for Ghana to regain its status as the world's leading producer of cocoa. This paper aims to provide a better understanding of the importance of the components of the cocoa agroecosystem and a simplified methodology for evaluating its resilience to perturbations. It presents a conceptual and methodological framework for the analysis and measurement of agroecosystem resilience in a participatory manner. The Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) method, allows for wider participation and detailed, context and location-specific resilience analysis. Estimating the cocoa agroecosystem's resilience using the three dimensions can help reduce the conceptual difficulties with the resilience approach that make it difficult to translate the resilience theory into practice. The objective of this study is (1) to measure the resilience of the cocoa agroecosystem by buffer capacity, adaptive capacity and self-organisation estimates and (2) to identify context-specific indicators to determine the resilience of the cocoa agroecosystem.