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Multi-scale policy diffusion and translation in Pacific Island coastal fisheries
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... Les densités de population humaines sont contrastées entre les plus grandes villes et les zones rurales ou les îles reculées (Andrew et al., 2019). Les insulaires du Pacifique dépendent fortement de leur environnement marin pour leur subsistance, revenus, culture, identité, échanges avec les autres îles, et pour la protection des côtes (Bell et al., 2009 ;Friedlander, 2018). ...
... Enfin, les projections montrent que le changement climatique devrait affecter l'océan Pacifique de différentes manières, avec des trajectoires d'exposition exacerbées par les vulnérabilités socio-économiques mêlées aux des problèmes environnementaux (Andrew et al., 2019 ;Bell et al., 2011a ;2011b ;Duvat et al., 2017). Le changement concerne les circulations océaniques et atmosphériques, la température de surface de la mer, la propagation d'agents pathogènes, les concentrations de CO2 dissous etc. (Kleypas et Yates, 2009). ...
... The scattered islands reveal high levels of endemism and endangered biodiversity, both across terrestrial and marine systems (Payri and Vidal, 2019). As of 2019, contrasted population densities are found between the largest cities and the most remote islands or rural areas (Andrew et al., 2019). Pacific islanders rely strongly on their marine environment for subsistence, income, culture, identity, exchanges with other islands, and coastal protection (Bell et al., 2009;Friedlander, 2018). ...
Effective conservation and sustainable resource management are critical. Systematic Conservation Planning (SCP) identifies the areas that best meet the trade-offs between conservation objectives and costs, providing managers with a transparent decision support. However, our state of the art indicates a tendency for marine SCP in Oceania to be too generic regarding local needs, revealing several orphaned themes, yet crucial locally. This thesis aims to fill this gap by examining four research questions, applied to three lagoons in French Polynesia. 1. How can ciguatera be integrated into SCP? 2. Can SCP guide pearl farming management? 3. Can SCP make a useful contribution to traditional management? 4. How can strategies for diversifying activities be designed with SCP? Connected to the problems of managers, to local criteria and based on spatial data from surveys of fishers, this thesis formalizes a new method for integrating ciguatera into the SCP and produces original results with optimized costs. Two strong aspects emerge: optimizing traditional fisheries management and identifying areas for reintroducing pearl oysters. This confirms the practical interest and the initial choice of a “think globally, act locally” approach. In a context where commitments for conservation and sustainable management are multiplying, the SCP proves to be a precious tool to reduce the gap between research and action by translating, in conjunction with the managers, international ambitions into adapted local responses.
... While there has been sustained interest in the complex and subjective diffusion of environmental norms (e.g., Sandbrook et al., 2019), the process of diffusion and the practical influence (i.e., beyond written commitments) of social meta-norms remains under-explored and largely unknown (Acosta et al., 2019;Okereke, 2008a;Song et al., 2019). A review of global environmental governance literature conducted as part of this study reveals only three articles that explicitly explore the diffusion of social metanorms in environmental governance (see Acosta et al., 2019;Okereke, 2008a;Song et al., 2019). ...
... While there has been sustained interest in the complex and subjective diffusion of environmental norms (e.g., Sandbrook et al., 2019), the process of diffusion and the practical influence (i.e., beyond written commitments) of social meta-norms remains under-explored and largely unknown (Acosta et al., 2019;Okereke, 2008a;Song et al., 2019). A review of global environmental governance literature conducted as part of this study reveals only three articles that explicitly explore the diffusion of social metanorms in environmental governance (see Acosta et al., 2019;Okereke, 2008a;Song et al., 2019). Specifically, Okereke, 2008a finds the diffusion of equity norms in global environmental regimes relies on the extent norms align with neoliberal ideas and structures. ...
... Specifically, Okereke, 2008a finds the diffusion of equity norms in global environmental regimes relies on the extent norms align with neoliberal ideas and structures. In the context of coastal fisheries, Song et al. (2019) find global-level policy commitments on gender and human rights have gained minimal traction in national level policies of Pacific Island countries. Similarly, Acosta et al. (2019) find that while commitments to gender mainstreaming in Ugandan climate and agricultural policies have been formally adopted at the national level, the 'gender equality' norm is watered down at several stages of the policy cycle. ...
Social meta-norms, including human rights, gender equality, equity and environmental justice, are mainstream principles of good environmental governance. The permeation of social meta-norms through global environmental goals, policies and agreements (e.g., the Sustainable Development Goals) is now generally accepted to be critical to the integrity of the Earth's system and to social dignity and opportunities for humanity. Yet, little is known about how globally articulated social meta-norms lead to shifts in action at other scales of governance. Specifically, analysis of the discursive and dynamic nature of social meta-norm diffusion is lacking. To build a better understanding of what shapes the diffusion of social meta-norms across different scales of environmental governance, we provide a synthesis that bridges political and sociological theory and underscores the critical role of agency in the diffusion process. We identify eight drivers of diffusion along a spectrum that ranges from prescriptive drivers, which leave little space for norm negotiation, to discursive drivers, which provide an enabling space for norm interpretation. We hypothesize these drivers intersect with a parallel spectrum of actor responses, ranging from complete resistance to social meta-norms at one end, to complete internalization of social meta-norms at the other. Our diagnostic of integrated drivers and responses is aimed at advancing conventional norm diffusion theory by providing a better account of discursive forces in this process. Applying these diagnostic elements to future empirical research has the potential to improve the rationale, speed, mode and impact of social meta-norm diffusion in multiscale environmental governance.
... Diffusion of gender into national level policy of Pacific island countries is difficult. In a review of gender policy diffusion in the Pacific region, Song et al. (2019) reveal minimal implementation of global level gender-focused policy commitments in national level policy by Pacific island countries due to a lack of willingness, interest, and importance placed on gender equality in fisheries. This is not confined to Pacific island countries or resource types, however, as Acosta et al. (2019) highlight gender policies within climate change and agriculture sectors of Uganda are watered down at the national level and through policy cycles. ...
... Diffusion of gender policies into national offshore fisheries policy in the Pacific has been slow and simplistic (Song et al. 2019) and Fiji is following this trend. This suggests a lack of willingness, interest, and importance placed on gender equality in fisheries. ...
Western and Central Pacific (WCP) tuna fisheries form part of a broad and complex social and ecological system (SES). This consists of interconnected elements including people (social, cultural, economic) and the biophysical environment in which they live. One area that has received little attention by policy makers is gender. Gender is important because it deepens understandings of behaviours, roles, power relations, policies, programs, and services that may differentially impact on social, ecological, economic, cultural, and political realities of people. This paper contributes a “first step” to examining gender issues in WCP tuna SES. Women’s roles in WCP tuna SES in Fiji are explored and an evaluation of the impact fisheries development policy has on gender equality over the past two decades is revealed. Three key findings emerged from interviews, focus group discussions, and observations: 1) traditional gendered roles remain where women are marginalised in either invisible or low-paid and unskilled roles, and violence is sanctioned; 2) gender mainstreaming of policy and practice remain simplistic and narrow, but are transitioning towards more equitable outcomes for women; and 3) failure to consider gender within the context of WCP tuna SES leads to unintended outcomes that undermine potential benefits of the fishery to broader society, especially to women. A multifaceted approach is recommended to integrate substantive gender equality into SES-based approaches. This research argues educating and getting women opportunities to work on boats falls short of redressing inequality and injustice that is embedded in the social, political, and economic status quo.
... The Pacific Ocean is steadily becoming congested with complementary policies (Song et al., 2019). Many policies antecede or overlap with the publication dates of others, including international conventions, thereby creating a preexisting policy frame into which policies should conform, increasing diffusion and limiting evolution (Song et al., 2019). ...
... The Pacific Ocean is steadily becoming congested with complementary policies (Song et al., 2019). Many policies antecede or overlap with the publication dates of others, including international conventions, thereby creating a preexisting policy frame into which policies should conform, increasing diffusion and limiting evolution (Song et al., 2019). Already, noting the possible fragmentation between policy regimes, calls have been made to increase the interplay and synergy (i.e., co-operation, coordination and action) between the regional and global levels of ocean governance, especially including Areas Beyond National Jurisdiction (Gjerde et al., 2018). ...
Oceans are governed by multiple policies at international, regional and national levels. National level policies have traditionally been sector-based, covering fisheries, tourism, environment etc. Recently more integrated and holistic National Ocean Policies (NOP) have been promulgated. The Pacific Ocean also has well-developed regional ocean-related policies spanning decades. The work presented here uses lexicometric analysis to map the interlinkages between regional and national policies to determine if they are evolving synergistically. Focusing on the Solomon Islands, due to its reliance on the ocean and producing a NOP in 2018, 13,622 expressions were extracted from the corpus of 8 national and 10 regional ocean-related policies. Network analysis displayed limited differentiation between the NOP, national sector-based policies and regional policies. Clustering of policies showed progressive splitting of policies from a single cluster, rather than by formation of a number of separate clusters. This behaviour reflects the thematic interlocking of policies: all share many themes, and the more integrative policies add a few additional sectoral themes. The themes rarely addressed in the corpus include energy, agriculture, pollution and education. The NOP was predominantly built on existing national or regional policies and their main themes rather than setting a new direction in ocean governance. The benefit of the NOP may be less about its content itself, but the creation of allied cross-ministerial architecture. With the intense pressure on the oceans and its resources in present times, there will be a growing need for more substantive policy evolution.
... While great enthusiasm has gathered around the HRBA and the use of human rights language, we argue that there remain notable con- ceptual ambiguities, which, if not made explicit with adequate discus- sion, may hinder our collective ability to implement HRBA within fisheries. In other words, notwithstanding other important factors that could impede progress (e.g., lack of administrative and cognitive ca- pacities, insufficient political will, and policy incoherence, see for ex- ample [8,9]), practical efforts to implement HRBA may also run aground because the inherent contradictions within concepts may go unnoticed and stay unresolved throughout its application. This paper focuses on illuminating the nuanced linkages that exist between the notions of fishing rights and human rights. ...
... Translating a set of human rights principles into policy and decision- making at country level appears an onerous process so far [7][8][9] -an observation also forwarded from the field of international development whose experiences of operationalizing HRBA are likely the most robust [25]. Applying the HRBA to fisheries is also complicated by their novel features: that the multiple aspects of human rights need to be realized for the holistic improvement of people's lives (civil, political, social, economic and cultural); that human rights principles needs to be in- tegrated into all phases of governance processes; and that, in doing so, the capacities of fishers to claim their rights (as right-holders) and those of government institutions to meet their obligations (as duty-bearers) need to be enhanced. ...
Human rights have become a salient topic in fisheries governance. There is an increasing call to operationalize human rights principles in management practices. Enthusiastically, human rights-related language has proliferated in policy texts and academic discourses, but seldom with precise understanding. This deficiency can create confusion and conflation on-the-ground, and is likely nowhere more pertinent than at the intersection of human rights and fishing rights with both converging on the application of rights. By applying a legal, applied perspective, this paper advances two aims. First, it distinguishes and clarifies key terms involved in a human rights-based approach, including human right, customary fishing right and constitutionally protected right to fish. Secondly, it exposes dilemmas that can arise when human rights and fishing rights are brought together in situations of rights allocation, that is, universality of human rights vs. exclusivity of fishing rights; rights versus attendant duties; prioritizing amongst competing human-cum-fishing rights; and individual vs. communal rights. Together, we submit that the human rights-based approach to fisheries will be most effective when a human rights-based approach is used to support (1) communal fishing rights rather than individual rights, assuming the community strives to ensure the basic dignity of all members by distributing fishing rights in a manner consistent with human rights principles, and (2) the fishing rights of small-scale fisheries against those of larger industrial fleets, rather than using it between two small-scale fishing groups. We illustrate these essential clarifications by drawing on contemporary examples from the Global South and North.
... The dynamics of international processes directly influence institutional change at the national level. It is common that international institutional norms of marine governance are diffused to national level institutional processes of various countries through various mechanisms of governance [157]. In such contexts, isomorphic diffusion and ideational theories provides very useful analytical tools for understanding institutional change. ...
Marine and coastal areas currently face an unprecedented level of multiple and interdependent anthropogenic and natural drivers of change. Increasing demand for use of marine and coastal space largely driven by the blue economy paradigm presents a myriad of sustainability challenges that require governance transformations and institutional innovation. Various institutional forms have already emerged in this realm, but recent processes will increase the spate of institutional change taking place. This calls for a comprehensive understanding of institutional change in the marine coastal realm; thus, an overview of the tools available for understanding such changes. In this paper, we assess the analytical potential of seven theories of institutional change in relation to the contextual features of marine and coastal systems. By applying the propositions of the various theories to empirical studies of institutional change in this arena, we aim to provide a repertoire of theories of institutional change to help marine social scientists understand and guide change in the marine coastal arena. The analysis reveals that all the theories have some relevance for understanding institutional change in the marine coastal realm, but the analytical strength of each theory depends on the specific institutional features, resource system, context, and scale of governance. Due to the material and institutional characteristics of the marine coastal area, no single theory is sufficient for understanding institutional change in this realm. The combination of multiple theories or the use of analytical frameworks provides better lens to illuminate institutional change in marine and coastal systems.
... The various components of such an integrated regime are sketched in Fig. 2. Given that transnational environmental governance is an axis intertwining state and non-state actors, we address a central concern in research on multi-level governance about how transnational actors and institutions interact with traditional intergovernmental and national forms of governance [14,19,24,65,66,34]. We operationalize this methodologically by cataloguing the interactions by geography and institutional scale. ...
... This pluralistic legal system is itself also nested within regional treaties and agreements of the Pacific Community and international law, including the law of the sea. The 'New Song' supporting local coastal fisheries is mostly compatible with the FAO Voluntary Guidelines for Securing Sustainable Small-Scale Fisheries (SSF Guidelines) (FAO 2015), with areas of divergence occurring around gender relations and human rights (Song et al. 2019), illustrating both the strengths and weaknesses of global policy harmonisation: it fosters coordination but potentially undermines cultural autonomy. The governance regime for the Pacific is thus both polycentric and plural, with the complex legal and policy environment responding to evolving relationships between people and the ocean at multiple jurisdictional levels. ...
People across the world have diverse economic, sociolegal, institutional, social and cultural relationships with the ocean—both its littoral zones and the open sea spaces through which people have traditionally navigated, migrated, fished, traded, played and sought solace, spiritual enlightenment, adventure, material enrichment, social identity, cultural expression, artistic inspiration or good health. These relationships are reflected in formal and informal institutions (polices, laws, social norms) that regulate many of these activities, including those that regulate access to resources. These institutions represent a series of prior claims and rights to the use and enjoyment of the ocean by coastal and maritime societies.
... Diffusion of gender policies into national offshore fisheries policy in the Pacific has been slow and simplistic (Song et al., 2019) and Fiji is following this trend. This suggests a lack of willingness, interest, and importance placed on gender equality in fisheries. ...
This thesis responds to the need to re-conceptualise the way in which oceans and the SESs they support are understood and governed. Contrary to traditional fisheries management frameworks, this thesis focusses on developing and testing an integrated transdisciplinary framework to examine SES networks. Western and Central Pacific (WCP) tuna fisheries are faced with complex and interlinked social and ecological challenges including high seas management issues, setting sustainable limits, climate change impacts, human rights violations, and illegal, unreported, and unregulated activities. At odds with this complexity, strong but narrow disciplinary fisheries science-based decisions dominate governance decisions. Effective governance across complex multi-scale systems in the WCP tuna fishery requires a more integrated understanding of social-ecological systems (SES). Transdisciplinary problem solving informed by participatory, SES research, and political ecology has the potential to reveal (and solve) complicated interactions and connections across ocean SES networks. A Social-Ecological-Oceans Systems Framework (SECO) was developed to capture the complexity, breadth and depth of the system and address interactions and connections between separate system components. The overarching research hypothesis for my thesis is that a transdisciplinary approach using political ecology and SES research can be used to assemble diverse theories, knowledges, methods, and analytical techniques. Such an approach can reveal and make sense of complicated interactions and connections across ocean SES networks. The hypothesis is tested using SECO in two place-specific studies; undertaken in Fiji and Solomon Islands, both of which are classified as Small Island Developing States. Place-specific studies are good for exploring interlinkages and complex causality in a 'real life' context. I argue that establishing fisheries management systems that are appropriately embedded into SES networks is critical to avoiding unintended outcomes. My research discovers drivers, key interlinkages, and systemic causes of unintended outcomes of tuna fisheries development and governance. Moreover, findings confirm Pacific-led grassroots multi-scalar governance is key to overcoming systemic barriers and taking hold of opportunities to achieving multiple societal goals. Future research could leverage the SECO contribution within the WCP tuna SES or other ocean SES networks.
... There are many cases where small-scale fisheries that supply domestic markets and consumption predominantly fall under co-management arrangements where government and/or non-governmental organizations work alongside community groups to design, implement and adjust management strategies (Govan 2009a, b;Jentoft 2013;Jupiter et al. 2014). Institutional support for fisheries co-management is bolstered by policy and funding commitments at global (FAO 2015a; Jentoft 2014), regional (FAO 2015b;Song et al. 2019), and national levels (Schwarz et al. 2017;FAO and WorldFish 2021). Implementation of co-management arrangements for marine and coastal fisheries and ecosystems appear to be proliferating (Govan 2009a, b;Mills et al. 2019;Smallhorn-West et al. 2020a, b). ...
Co-management, a governance process whereby management responsibility is shared between resource users and other collaborators, is a mainstream approach for governing social and ecological aspects of small-scale fisheries. While many assessments of co-management are available for single time periods, assessments across longer time-scales are rare–meaning the dynamic nature, and long-term outcomes, of co-management are insufficiently understood. In this study we analyse ten-years of catch and effort data from a co-managed, multi-species reef fishery in Solomon Islands. To further understand social, ecological and management dynamics we also draw on interviews with fishers and managers that had been conducted throughout the same decade. We aimed to answer (1) what are the temporal trends in fishing effort, harvesting efficiency, and catch composition within and beyond a periodically-harvested closure (i.e. a principal and preferred management tool in Pacific island reef fisheries), and, (2) what are the internal and external drivers that acted upon the fishery, and its management. Despite high fishing effort within the periodically-harvested closure, catch per unit effort remained stable throughout the ten years. Yet the taxonomic composition of catch changed substantially as species targeted early in the decade became locally depleted. These observations indicate that both the frequency of harvesting and the volumes harvested may have outpaced the turnover rates of target species. We argue that this reflects a form of hyperstability whereby declining abundance is not apparent through catch per unit effort since it is masked by a shift to alternate species. While the community sustained and adapted their management arrangements over the decade as a response to internal pressures and some signs of resource changes, some external social and ecological drivers were beyond their capabilities to govern. We argue the collaborative, knowledge exchange, and learning aspects of adaptive co-management may need even more attention to deal with this complexity, particularly as local and distal pressures on multi-species fisheries and community governance intensify.
Graphical abstract
... al., 2019). Within fisheries management, Diffusion of Innovation theory examines adoption of fisheries management policies (Song et al., 2019) and fishing technology (Acheson and Reidman, 1982;Dewees and Hawkes, 1988). ...
The “Georgia Jumper” turtle excluder device (TED) is a rare example of a well-accepted conservation tool required by regulation. Mediated by the UGA Marine Extension and Georgia Sea Grant, Georgia's shrimping industry was integral to the design, revision, and implementation of excluder devices, since the earliest “jellyball shooter” proposed to NMFS in 1980. This paper highlights fisher involvement in the creation of the popular “Georgia Jumper” TED. Both the Diffusion of Innovation and the Traditional Ecological Knowledge literatures stress the importance of meaningful engagement of user communities in the development of new management approaches, and make specific recommendations for improving uptake of new methods. Consistent with literature expectations, fisher and industry participation in the development, testing, and implementation of TEDs has been key to the general acceptance of TEDs in Georgia. This paper illustrates the importance of fisher participation in conservation efforts such as these.
... The research methods of public policy dissemination mainly focus on directed dyadic analysis [34], document-based comparison [35], and document search method [36]. The current policy dissemination model only explores the laws of temporal-spatial dissemination of the same policies in different regions from the perspective of communication. ...
Cultivated land protection is the top priority of the national economy in China and the livelihood of people. Cultivated land protection policies (CLPP) play an important role in the protection of cultivated land. However, the process of dissemination of CLPP on social networks of farmers has problems, such as distortion of policy content, single dissemination channels, low level of farmers' knowledge, and low dissemination efficiency. For revealing the characteristics of the dissemination of CLPP in the farmers' social networks (FSN), this study combines the Suspected-Exposed-Infected-Recovered-Suspected (SEIRS) epidemic model to construct a model of CLPP dissemination suitable for FSN. In addition, a numerical simulation of the dissemination process of CLPP is conducted on the FSN, and the influence of the structural characteristics of the FSN and different model parameters on the dissemination of CLPP is analyzed. Results show that (1) the dissemination rate between farmers in FSN has a significant impact on the scale and speed of CLPP. A greater initial dissemination rate corresponds to faster speed and larger scale of CLPP dissemination. (2) A greater node degree in FSN means stronger dissemination ability for CLPP. Therefore, identifying structural holes (opinion leaders) in FSN can effectively promote the dissemination of CLPP. (3) The SEIRS model can dynamically describe the evolution law of CLPP dissemination process over time through the four states of farmer nodes of suspected, exposed, infected, and recovered. Numerical simulation results show that the immune degradation rate is proportional to CLPP. However, the direct immunization rate is inversely proportional. The increase in immune degradation rate can reduce the number of recovered farmers and improve the efficiency of CLPP dissemination. On the basis of the abovementioned conclusions, this study draws policy recommendations to increase the scale and speed of CLPP dissemination in China.
... This study also found that diction can cause problems for translators, especially second self-pronouns, proverbs, and figurative language. Besides, many words related to cultural elements cannot be translated properly [19]. ...
... A greater familiarity with more contextualized policy processes and products (i.e., national fisheries agencies have been part of drafting these documents) has likely added to the increased awareness of regional guidelines over the SSF Guidelines in the Pacific so far. As a result, many government fisheries officers in the region are only beginning to be receptive of the SSF Guidelines, with the recommendation of using it to guide their countries' fisheries management programmes gradually being accepted (Song et al., 2019a). Nevertheless, the high degree of thematic overlap, or policy coherence, between the SSF Guidelines and the region-specific documents presents an encouraging institutional starting point for building a lasting governance transformation that could benefit the small-scale fisheries of the Pacific Island countries Song et al., 2017). ...
Recently, oceans have become the focus of substantial global attention and diverse appeals for "transformation." Calls to transform ocean governance are motivated by various objectives, including the need to secure the rights of marginalized coastal communities, to boost ocean-based economic development, and to reverse global biodiversity loss. This paper examines the politics of ocean governance transformations through an analysis of three ongoing cases: the FAO's voluntary guidelines for small-scale fisheries; debt-for-"blue"-nature swaps in the Seychelles; and the United Nations' negotiations for a high seas' treaty. We find that transformations are not inevitable or apolitical. Rather, changes are driven by an array of actors with different objectives and varying degrees of power. Objectives are articulated and negotiated through interactions that may reassemble rights, access, and control; however, there is also the potential that existing conditions become further entrenched rather than transformed at all. In particular, our analysis suggests that: (1) efforts to transform are situated in contested, historical landscapes that bias the trajectory of transformation, (2) power dynamics shape whose agendas and narratives drive transformational change, and (3) transformations create uneven distributions of costs and benefits that can facilitate or stall progress toward intended goals. As competing interests over ocean spaces continue to grow in the coming decades, understanding the processes through which ocean governance transformations can occur-and making the politics of transformative change more explicit-will be critical for realizing equitable ocean governance.
... Vocal opposition to CBFM may surface by social groups who experience negative side effects or feel insufficiently involved in decision making. At the same time, this is the phase where government officers, fishery extension workers, and fishing communities would start to embed or reinforce CBFM principles in the daily routines and practices (see Song et al. 2019). ...
Community-based approaches to fisheries management has emerged as a mainstream strategy to govern dispersed, diverse and dynamic small scale fisheries. However, amplifying local community led sustainability outcomes remains an enduring challenge. We seek to fill a theoretical gap in the conceptualization of ‘scaling up community-based fisheries management’. We draw on literature of agriculture innovations to provide a framework that takes into account process-driven and structural change occurring across multiple levels of governance, as well as different phases of scaling. We hypothesize that successful scaling requires engagement with all aspects of a governing regime, coalescing a range of actors, and therefore, is an enterprise that is larger than its parts. To demonstrate where the framework offers value, we illustrate the development of community-based fisheries management in Vanuatu according to the framework’s main scaling dimensions.
... While the role of scientists and knowledge production in SSF governance has been studied from multiple perspectives (Jarić et al., 2012;Mather et al., 2008;Smith and Basurto, 2019;Syed et al., 2018), and research on the implementation of key policy instruments like the SSF Guidelines is underway (Chuenpagdee and Jentoft, 2018;Jentoft et al., 2017;Singleton et al., 2017;Song et al., 2019), a closer examination of the role of international development actors in shaping environmental governance agendas through funding in the context of SSF is needed. ...
Small-scale fisheries are becoming a global social and environmental concern. The contribution of marine small-scale fisheries to global food security and coastal livelihoods, coupled with the significant challenges they face, has attracted increasing attention and aid from environmental organizations, philanthropies, and multilateral agencies over recent decades. Our study attends to the understudied role of the World Bank, the largest individual funder shaping present and future sustainability of coastal marine regions, as a key actor shaping global environmental governance paradigms. We asked how funding to the sector has changed over the last 50 years and why, outlining distinct patterns in the flow of small-scale fisheries aid and the underlying intervention models. We contextualize our quantitative analysis of aid patterns over time with qualitative interview data with bank staff, identifying underlying paradigm shifts driven by internal and external factors. More than $2.48 billion was allocated by the World Bank to marine fisheries over the last 50 years, approximately 47% (~$1.17 billion) of which was targeted to marine small-scale fisheries. Three distinct funding periods are identified: rising support to SSF from the 1970s to mid-1980s; a sharp decline in funding in the mid-to-late 1980s and low levels of funding throughout the 1990s; and a steady return to funding SSF in the mid-2000s up to the present. Over time, Bank-funded interventions shifted from pure economic development in the earlier era, to an emphasis on governance and multi-dimensional environmental goals in the recent period. To understand why, we used key-informant interviews to unpack major internal drivers: internal staff changes and presence of key individuals, the decentralization and recentralization of decision-making, and the organization's shifting emphasis from traditional economic growth to multi-dimensional objectives of poverty reduction, among others. External drivers behind funding and paradigm shifts included pressure from the environmental movement, the rise of sustainable development discourses, key global environmental summits in the 1990s, and rising levels of interest in the fisheries sector by the governments of both donor and recipient countries. Processes of 'paradigm shifts' were not swift or singular, rather they were affected by multiple, convergent factors over time. Our findings contribute to the literature on multilateral institutions as key actors in environmental governance shaping global development thinking, illustrating the arc of the last half-century of fisheries aid at the Bank while highlighting present dilemmas and future challenges that actors interested in working towards sustainable marine small-scale fisheries face.
... Yet, language related to gender equality found in regional and national fisheries policies continues to be broad and even conflicting (Cornwall & Rivas, 2015;Lawless et al., 2020). For example, an analysis of smallscale fisheries policy found that gender commitments across global, regional and national level policies of Pacific Island countries and territories were not coherent, open to wide interpretation and, in some cases, completely overlooked (Song et al., 2019). Flexibility within and towards commitments can enable diverse and subjective interpretations of gender equality by different fisheries actors (i.e., policy-makers versus fish workers) (e.g., Johnson, 2017), and also allow adaptations to sectoral, national and local contexts (Jentoft, 2014). ...
Gender equality is a mainstream principle of good environmental governance and sustainable development. Progress toward gender equality in the fisheries sector is critical for effective and equitable development outcomes in coastal countries. However, while commitments to gender equality have surged at global, regional and national levels, little is known about how this principle is constructed, and implemented across different geographies and contexts. Consequently, progress toward gender equality is difficult to assess and navigate. To identify influential policy instruments (n = 76), we conducted key-informant interviews with governance actors engaged in small-scale fisheries (n = 26) and gender and development (n = 9) sectors across the Pacific Islands region. We systematically analysed these instruments according to (1) representations of gender and gender equality, (2) rationales for pursing gender, and (3) gender strategies and actions. We found that fisheries policy instruments frequently narrowed the concept of gender to a focus on women, whereas gender and development policy instruments considered gender as diverse social identities, norms and relations. In fisheries policy instruments, rationales for pursuing gender equality diverged substantially yet, overall the principle was predominantly pursued for instrumental (i.e., improved environmental outcomes) rather than intrinsic (i.e., an inherent value in fairness) reasons. Over two-thirds of gender equality strategies focused on an organization’s own human resourcing and project assessments, rather than on direct action within communities, or for women and men reliant on fisheries. Our findings illustrate gender equality commitments and investments to be narrow and outdated. Critical shifts in dominant gender equality narratives and objectives, and an embrace of multi-level strategies, provide opportunities for fisheries governance and development agendas to rise to current best practice, and ultimately make meaningful (opposed to rhetorical) progress toward gender equality. The methodological approach we develop holds value for other development sectors to critically examine, and subsequently enhance, commitment toward gender equality.
... Blue carbon is no exception in this regard. As this review has shown, the conventional global-to-national spread of policy ideals has been vigorously underway via international coalitions through multilateral negotiations or via bilateral assistance (see Song et al., 2019;Lawless et al., 2020). As a result, policy enthusiasm regarding blue carbon is now evident in many "recipient" countries in the Global South, including the Philippines. ...
The current focus on mangroves as key ecosystems in mitigating the impacts of climate change has largely neglected the livelihoods of coastal dwellers interacting with mangroves. This article provides a review of scholarly and policy attention paid to these social groups and their means of struggle. It argues that the latest dominant governance discourse tying mangroves to blue carbon signifies a departure from catering to coastal people's interests and rights in mangroves. We describe the evolving discourses that have shaped mangrove use and conservation in the Philippines since the 1970s. While the mid-century preoccupation with mangrove conversion to fish farms gradually gave way to the pursuit of community-based mangrove conservation in the late 1980s and 1990s, recent experiences suggest a comparably weakened focus towards recognizing local access and use patterns. We contend that the present blue carbon framing of mangroves, which harbours technocratic and financialized ideals of sustainability, poses a fundamental disadvantage to local users of mangroves. We conclude by reflecting on ways to redress this trend via a new framing of mangroves.
... Thus far, the main questions that have been posed in relation to scale have been whether or not the Guidelines will scale down in practice (Jentoft, 2014), and as it is mobilized, how it will cohere with pre-existing policy frameworks at different scalar levels (e.g., national, regional) (A. Song, Cohen, Hanich, Morrison, & Andrew, 2019;A. M. Song, Cohen, & Morrison, 2017). ...
Scale is a powerful concept, a lens that shapes how we perceive problems and solutions in common-pool resource governance. Yet, scale is often treated as a relatively stable and settled concept in commons scholarship. This paper reviews the origins and evolution of scalar thinking in commons scholarship in contrast with theories of scale in human geography and political ecology that focus on scale as a relational, power-laden process. Beginning with early writings on scale and the commons, this paper traces the emergence of an explicit scalar epistemology that orders both spatial and conceptual relationships vertically, as hierarchically nested levels. This approach to scale underpins a shared conceptualization of common-pool resource systems but inevitably illuminates certain questions and relationships while simultaneously obscuring others. Drawing on critiques of commonplace assumptions about scale from geography, we reread this dominant scalar framework for its analytic limitations and unintended effects. Drawing on examples from small-scale fisheries governance throughout, we contrast what is made visible in the commons through the standard approach to scale against an alternative, process-based approach to scale. We offer a typology of distinct dimensions and interrelated moments that produce scale in the commons coupled with new empirical and reflexive scale questions to be explored. We argue that engaging with theoretical advances on the production of scale in scholarship on the commons can generate needed attention to power and long-standing blind spots, enlivening our understanding of the dynamically scaled nature of the commons.
... In the Pacific Islands, a region with high reliance on SSF, there have been preliminary efforts to: (1) understand the factors shaping the adoption (or lack of adoption) of gender equality commitments by national governments [e.g. [17][18][19]; (2) produce a series of national stocktakes of the gender mainstreaming efforts of Pacific Island governments [e.g. [20][21][22]; and (3) conduct national gender and fisheries analyses [e.g. ...
Fisheries, like other sectors, is not immune to gender inequality, and women tend to experience the brunt of inequality as undervalued and underrepresented actors in fisheries management and development. A comprehensive understanding of the gender approaches in use, including potential barriers to their implementation, is needed to promote gender equitable outcomes in the small-scale fisheries (SSF) sector. We conducted interviews with fisheries managers and practitioners working in Fiji, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu between 2018 and 2019. We found gender inclusive approaches were broadly applied in three ways: (a) through community-based projects and programs (e.g., inclusive participation techniques); (b) national level research and policy; and (c) internal organizational operations (e.g. gender-sensitive recruitment policies). Although fisheries organizations approached gender inclusion in diverse ways, when critically evaluated according to gender best practice we found 76.2% of approaches were designed to 'reach' women, and very few 'benefited', 'empowered', or 'transformed' women's lives. 'Gender' was conflated to 'women' indicating a poor understanding of what gender inclusion means in practice. We found gender inclusive approaches were limited by the knowledge and capacities of fisheries managers and practitioners, and inhibitive institutional cultures. We argue that SSF organizations need to build explicit institutional gender commitment, strategies and systematic efforts to implement gender approaches with effective accountability mechanisms in place. While the fisheries sector is in its infancy, the plethora and diversity of development organizations in the Pacific provides a unique opportunity to build strategic partnerships to improve gender inclusion in practice in SSF management and development. Such a step can assist the transition from gender inclusive approaches being 'new' to the 'norm' whilst setting a benchmark for what is acceptable practice.
... nd agreements of the Pacific Community and international law, including the law of the sea . The 'New Song' supporting local coastal fisheries is mostly compatible with the FAO Voluntary Guidelines for Securing Sustainable Small-Scale Fisheries (SSF Guidelines) (FAO 2015), with areas of divergence occurring around gender relations and human rights (Song et al . 2019), illustrating both the strengths and weaknesses of global policy harmonisation: it fosters coordination but potentially undermines cultural autonomy . The governance regime for the Pacific is thus both polycentric and plural, with the complex legal and policy environment responding to evolving relationships between people and the ocean ...
Through a historical lens, this paper illustrates the differing economic, legal, institutional, social and cultural relationships people of varying cultures have with the ocean.
Focusing on the institutions that affect access and rights, this paper addresses concerns about the appropriation of marine resources and displacement of indigenous visions for ocean governance by identifying ways in which these culturally distinct institutions are compatible and charting a path toward inclusive ocean governance.
... "coastal fisheries management is not only about managing fish; it is about supporting people at the community level" (Noumea Strategy, p.6). On the other hand, the vision promoted by the MSG Roadmap, which endeavors to contribute to the building up of "[m]ultilateral consensus on the development and management of coastal fisheries" ( [75]; p.141), highly resembles the phrasing of the Noumea Strategy: it aims for "sustainable inshore fisheries, well managed using community-based approaches that provide long-term economic, social, ecological and food security benefits to our communities" (MSG Roadmap, p.4). The substantial role of empowered 'communities', as both actors and beneficiaries in foreseen coastal fisheries management, becomes even more apparent when the roadmap formulates its guiding principles. ...
While categorized as Small Island Developing States, South Pacific Island nations are the custodians of major ocean areas containing marine resources of high commercial and environmental significance. Yet, these resources are threatened by climate change, overfishing, Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing, as well as habitat destruction. The study, carried out in the early stage of the interdisciplinary research project SOCPacific (https://socpacific.net), aims to: a) identify the main policies on which fisheries management is currently based in the South Pacific, particularly in Fiji, New Caledonia and Vanuatu; b) investigate the evolution over time of key issues covered in these policies and related to coastal and/or offshore fisheries sectors; c) trace disconnections on the matter between legally binding instruments and non-binding strategies. A list of more than 200 documents relevant to regional fisheries management was gathered and separated into legally binding instruments and non-binding strategies. Legal instruments focused more on offshore issues (tuna fisheries and IUU fishing) and increasingly covered IUU fishing issues, confirming that tuna fisheries have an established hard policy arena. In strategies pertaining to coastal fisheries, community involvement appears as a key topic and a clear overall trend towards increasingly addressing climate change was spotlighted. Sustainability, community involvement, climate change, and food security issues are more covered in strategies than in legal instruments. Topics mostly addressed in relation to coastal areas are not substantially covered in legal instruments, suggesting that establishing binding measures might not be deemed as beneficial as strategies in coastal fields.
... A number of commentators have now assessed the alignment of the global SSF Guidelines with Pacific regional strategies, e.g. 'A New Song for Coastal Fisheries' (SPC 2015) and national legislation (Gourlie et al. 2018;Song et al. 2019a), and the resulting potential to (a) provide impetus to improving food security and livelihood of Pacific Islanders (Song et al. 2017) and (b) identify how human-rights-based approaches (FAO 2015) can practically help secure smallscale fishers' rights (Song and Soliman 2019). The intent of Section 18 as described, even if not immediately clear to new readers of the rather formal language of the FMA, embodies community empowerment, equality and raising of community voices. ...
Like many Pacific countries, Solomon Islands has more than one legal system operating concurrently: customary law, statutory law and the common law of England. Governance also occurs at national, provincial and local scales. Local people managing coastal and marine resources under customary marine tenure (CMT) have increasing difficulties in enforcement as external threats exceed their scope of governance. Before 2015, CMT breaches were not a fisheries violation as recognised by the western legal system. Drawing on our involvement in developing a new Fisheries Management Bill in 2007–2015 and consultations within the Solomon Islands Ministry of Fisheries and Marine Resources, we examine how, and to what effect, the resultant Act—specifically Section 18 on Community Fisheries Management Plans (CFMPs)—has accommodated or shifted the relationship between customary governance systems and the state’s contemporary fisheries legislation. We examine if, and how, employing Section 18 can contribute to regional and global fisheries governance policy implementation. The Fisheries Management Act 2015 recognises the rights of customary rights holders to institute CFMPs, provides a mechanism to codify and enforce access and use rights through CMT and empowers these efforts as a legitimate management tool under statutory law. We conclude that statutory law has been ‘nudged’ to make space for the dynamic process of customary law. We contend that use of Section 18 has the potential to elevate community voices in discussions of coastal and marine resource management at different scales, if practitioners do not lose sight of the intent behind the statute’s development.
Fisheries extension programmes frequently fail to secure mandatory or voluntary adoption of bycatch reduction devices and techniques. Approaches for improving the outcomes of extension programmes are often based on ad hoc assessments and do not consider human behaviour or change theories. This paper offers an in-depth analysis of extension activities that led to various adoption outcomes in two prominent bycatch case studies in the United States: turtle excluder devices in shrimp trawl fisheries and dolphin bycatch in the tuna purse seine fishery. Using a grounded theory approach to text analysis of interviews and documents, I examine five periods of voluntary or mandatory adoption efforts. I explain the outcomes through the lens of diffusion of innovation theory. The most effective extension programme involved informative and persuasive efforts, enforced regulations, and commercially practical bycatch reduction devices. Voluntary adoption occurred under exceptional circumstances of public and political pressure and a device that offered substantial benefits to the adopter. The two periods of successful adoption applied the most core principles of diffusion theory. This paper concludes with recommendations for how change agents can apply diffusion theory to future fisheries extension programmes to improve the adoption of bycatch reduction devices.
Research-engaged decision making and policy reform processes are critical to advancing resilience, adaptation, and transformation in social-ecological systems under stress. Here we propose a new conceptual framework to assess opportunities for research engagement in the policy process, building upon existing understandings of power dynamics and the political economy of policy reform. We retrospectively examine three cases of research engagement in small-scale fisheries policy and decision making, at national level (Myanmar) and at regional level (Pacific Islands region and sub-Saharan Africa), to illustrate application of the framework and highlight different modes of research engagement. We conclude with four principles for designing research to constructively and iteratively engage in policy and institutional reform: (a) nurture multi-stakeholder coalitions for change at different points in the policy cycle, (b) engage a range of forms and spaces of power, (c) embed research communications to support and respond to dialogue, and (d) employ evaluation in a cycle of action, learning, and adaptation. The framework and principles can be used to identify entry points for research engagement and to reflect critically upon the choices that researchers make as actors within complex processes of change.
Key Words: action research; dialogue; governance; partnerships; policy reform; power
In the literature on coastal land reclamation and ecological restoration policies, the role of policy translation has received limited attention vis-à-vis domestic political factors. This paper addresses this knowledge gap by clarifying the role of Dutch actors in developing South Korea's coastal management policies. To do so, we first develop an analytical framework that operationalizes the ‘policy translation’ concept into distinguishable components. This framework is used in the analysis of Korean land reclamation and wetland restoration policies. Our analysis reveals that in both cases no full-fledged policy transfer has occurred but that powerful domestic actors used other countries' policy elements to shape national discourses. Based on our analysis, we discuss the role of policy translation in understanding domestic policy change. We conclude that developing large water management projects is inherently political and the input of external ideas are no exclusion to this. Therefore, our paper makes a case for a more combined and integrated assessment of the role of both foreign and domestic factors in future studies on the development of coastal management policies.
Global visions of environmental change consider gender equality to be a foundation of sustainable social-ecological systems. Similarly, social-ecological systems frameworks position gender equality as both a precursor to, and a product of, system sustainability. Yet, the degree to which gender equality is being advanced through social-ecological systems change is uncertain. We use the case of small-scale fisheries in the Pacific Islands region to explore the proposition that different social-ecological narratives: (1) ecological, (2) social-ecological, and (3) social, shape the gender equality priorities, intentions and impacts of implementing organizations. We conducted interviews with regional and national fisheries experts (n = 71) and analyzed gender commitments made within policies (n = 29) that influence small-scale fisheries. To explore these data, we developed a ‘Tinker-Tailor-Transform’ gender assessment typology. We find that implementing organizations aligned with the social-ecological and social narratives considered social (i.e., human-centric) goals to be equally or more important than ecological (i.e., eco-centric) goals. Yet in action, gender equality was pursued instrumentally to achieve ecological goals and/or shallow project performance targets. These results highlight that although commitments to gender equality were common, when operationalized commitments become diluted and reoriented. Across all three narratives, organizations mostly ‘Tinkered’ with gender equality in impact, for example, including more women in spaces that otherwise tended to be dominated by men. Impacts predominately focused on the individual (i.e., changing women) rather than driving communal-to-societal level change. We discuss three interrelated opportunities for organizations in applying the ‘Tinker-Tailor-Transform’ assessment typology, including its utility to assist organizations to orient toward intrinsic goals; challenge or reconfigure system attributes that perpetuate gender inequalities; and consciously interrogate discursive positions and beliefs to unsettle habituated policies, initiatives and theories of change.
The United Nations OEWG (Open Ended Working Group) focused on cybersecurity provides the context for an examination of idea entrepreneurship regarding the role of nonstate actors and the concepts of human rights, gender and sustainable development against the backdrop of a global pandemic and increasing cybersecurity challenges. Crafting a cross-disciplinary conceptual framework based upon a review of relevant literatures, this study uses archival and content analysis to highlight those organizations serving as idea entrepreneurs and those contesting such ideas. Findings include the presence of key divides among idea entrepreneur organizations (including among nation-state organizations themselves) as well as key linkages among a ‘galaxy’ or interconnection of ideas forged with potential to bridge such divides. Additionally, mention of the pandemic emerges as a factor catalyzing idea entrepreneurship with a focus on critical infrastructures.
This article synthesizes and compares environmental governance theories. For each theory we outline its main tenets, claims, origin, and supporting literature. We then group the theories into focused versus combinatory frameworks for comparison. The analysis resonates with many types of ecosystems; however, to make it more tangible, we focus on coastal systems. First, we characterize coastal governance challenges and then later link salient research questions arising from these challenges to the theories that may be useful in answering them. Our discussion emphasizes the usefulness of having a diverse theoretical toolbox, and we argue that if governance analysts are more broadly informed about the theories available, they may more easily engage in open-minded interdisciplinary collaboration. The eight theories examined are the following: polycentricity, network governance, multilevel governance, collective action, governmentality (power / knowledge), adaptive governance, interactive governance theory (IGT), and evolutionary governance theory (EGT). Polycentricity and network governance both help examine the links or connections in governance processes. Polycentricity emphasizes structural configurations at a broader level, and network governance highlights agency and information flow within and between individuals or organizations. Collective action theory is helpful for examining community level governance, and helps analyze variables hindering or enabling self-organization and shared resource outcomes. In contrast, multilevel governance helps understand governance integration processes between localities, regions, and states across administrative, policy, or legal dimensions. Governmentality is helpful for understanding the role of discourse, power, knowledge, and narratives in governance, such as who creates them and who becomes governed by them with what effect. Adaptive governance helps analyze the links between context, change, and resilience. IGT helps examine the interdependencies between the systems being governed and the governing systems. EGT is helpful for unpacking how coevolutionary processes shape governance and the options for change.
Vanuatu has a long history of efforts to manage coastal fisheries, from customary practices to various forms of contemporary community-based fisheries management (CBFM) promoted by non-governmental organisations and government projects. In this article we summarise how the experiences and lessons over the last 25 years have shaped the CBFM model Vanuatu now uses.
The Western and Central Pacific Ocean is home to the largest tuna fishery in the world – around half of the world’s tuna supply – and is a vital economic resource for Pacific island countries.
The potential of the Pacific tuna fishery to contribute to economic development in the Pacific island countries is enormous, but will require a cooperative regional strategy to maximise access fees from distant water fishing nations, as well as targeted domestic policy and legislation to encourage local fishing industries. Together with the importance of acting strategically with regard to such a variable resource, the lesson of fisheries management globally is that it is most effective when it takes into consideration social, cultural and political contexts.
Based on an extensive study of six Pacific island states, Capturing Wealth from Tuna maps out the aspirations and limitations of six Pacific island countries and proposes strategies for capturing more wealth from this resource in a sustainable and socially equitable manner.
Concerns about the sustainability of small-scale fisheries, and the equitable distribution of fisheries benefits, are wide-spread within government agencies, non-government organizations, and rural fishing communities throughout Pacific Island Countries and Territories. Addressing these concerns was given renewed impetus in recent years with the completion and adoption of the Voluntary Guidelines for Securing Sustainable Small-Scale Fisheries (SSF Guidelines). This global document enters a complex policy landscape within the Pacific region. In anticipation of its region-wide implementation, this chapter focuses on policy coherence; using Solomon Islands as a case we investigate the potential interplay of the SSF Guidelines with priority policies at the regional, national, and sub-national levels. We first examine the SSF Guidelines to identify 22 dominant themes, including human rights, adaptive capacity, and tenure rights. We then focus in on 11 on policy instruments known to directly influence small-scale fisheries governance; we examine to what extent and in which direction the small-scale fisheries themes are represented in these 11 regional, national, and sub-national policies. We find areas of incoherence in addition to nine themes that are relatively poorly represented (‘gaps’) in the current policy landscape. More positively, however, we also observe a large-scale overlap on many of the key themes. While our analysis is specific in its application to Solomon Islands, our approach to diagnose areas of incoherence and gaps is easily applicable to other countries. This type of policy-based analysis is a useful first step to understanding priorities and strategies for implementation, and in particular opportunities for the SSF Guidelines to prompt adjustment and transformation of existing policies.
Fisheries
Guidelines — Pacific Island countries and territories are being called on to lead the process of national
implementation and monitoring to improve socioeconomic and environmental conditions in coastal fisheries
and fishing communities. To aid this effort, we compare these policies on three levels — visions, guiding
principles and recommendations — to determine if a harmonised approach to implementing these two
policies is possible. We conclude that there are many points of agreement between the two although the
Small-Scale Fisheries Guidelines offer firm recommendations on human rights, whereas the New Song specifically
suggests community-based approaches as a management solution, and calls strongly for interagency
coordination. Overall, we present a view that, when accompanied by nuanced regional and national
interpretation, effective implementation of the New Song could serve as a workable operationalisation of
the Small-Scale Fisheries Guidelines in the Pacific.
Significance
Global sustainability depends on robust environmental governance regimes. An investigation of the Great Barrier Reef regime between 1975 and 2016 reveals how complex environmental regimes become increasingly structurally dense and eventually reach a point of stabilization. However, structural complexity and stability alone do not necessarily mean the system is robust. Instead, a complex but stable structure can mask exogenous change, which then can generate more endogenous change; this phenomenon has implications for the environmental outcomes of complex regimes. Therefore, it is vital to anticipate and account for change in designing, implementing, and evaluating sustainable environmental governance.
During the 1990s, a new regulatory pattern in domestic environmental policy making emerged. This pattern is largely a result of policy diffusion. In the absence of formal obligations, regulatory instruments that have been communicated internationally and were already being practiced elsewhere were voluntarily emulated and adopted by policy makers. While the international promotion of regulatory instruments often facilitated their diffusion, the instruments’ characteristics determined the extent and speed by which regulatory instruments spread across countries. The voluntary adoption of regulatory instruments cannot be exclusively explained by the rational motivation of policy makers to improve effectiveness. In addition, they were motivated by concerns of legitimacy and perceived pressure to conform with international norms.
New Environmental Policy Instruments (NEPIs) are becoming increasingly attractive. From a global perspective, there has been a rapid diffusion of these market-based, voluntary or informational instruments. This article examines the spread of four different NEPIs – eco-labels, energy or carbon taxes, national environmental policy plans or strategies for sustainable development, and free-access-of-information (FAI) provisions. The adoption of NEPIs by national policy makers is not simply a reaction to newly emerging environmental problems or to real or perceived deficits of traditional command and control regulation, rather the use of NEPIs can also be ascribed to the inner dynamics of international processes of policy transfer or policy diffusion. These processes make it increasingly difficult for national policy makers to ignore new approaches in environmental policy that have already been put into practice in ‘forerunner’ countries.
Many argue today that global governance is ‘in crisis’. This reflects an undue emphasis on the fate of multilateral institutions: if they are deadlocked, global governance does not appear to be progressing. This is misplaced. Today, global governance is increasingly being pursued not by erecting supranational institutions empowered to govern issue areas directly, but by transforming states' internal governance to enact international disciplines domestically. In many policy domains, efforts are underway to reshape state institutions, laws and governance processes in accordance with global priorities, regulatory standards and action plans. However, because these moves privilege certain interests and ideologies over others, this is a heavily contested process. The politics of global governance thus occurs not just at the global level, but at the local level too. The argument in this article is illustrated using examples from maritime security and anti-money laundering governance.
Recently, a human rights approach has been center-staged within fisheries governance as a response to the limits of private property rights in reducing insecurity and vulnerability among fishers and fishing communities. Despite its growing adoption in international legal frameworks and among civil society organizations, the conceptual pitfalls of the human rights approach to fisheries (i.e., its neoliberal tendencies and the neglect of collective rights and social duties) raised by critical scholarship remain largely unsettled, leading to practical concerns about whether such a framework will ultimately benefit fishers on the ground. To further contribute to the debate, this article presents a nuanced discussion of the human rights perspective by introducing the concept of human dignity. Specifically, it argues that human dignity, with its greater conceptual scope and depth, could act as a foundational value with which to mitigate some of the shortcomings of the human rights approach. The purpose here is suggestive rather than definitive and is aimed at highlighting the link that has not been clearly made between human rights and human dignity. I argue that heightened attention to human dignity has the potential to create wider support for the human rights approach and ultimately help facilitate its efficacy in fisheries.
Coastal and inshore fisheries policies do not adequately support sustainable management
• The majority of PICTs do not have Coastal Fisheries Policies though 3 PICTs do, 4 are in the process of drafting them and 2 may be adequately covered in other policy.
• The lack of coastal fisheries policies is compounded by their low likelihood of resulting in improved fisheries management based on current experiences.
Improving coastal fisheries management in the short term should be better addressed through improved drafting of workplans, staff job descriptions and allocation of increased and decentralised budgets.
Governments are not allocating adequate operational resources for coastal fisheries management
• Most fisheries agencies usually do not clearly distinguish budget lines or staffing between coastal fisheries management and other functions. Aid projects and funding for fisheries development do not make up for the lack of investment in routine resource management and may actually have negative impacts.
• This is particularly of concern given the low levels of budgetary and staff support relative to the massive coastal and oceanic resources for which the PICTs are responsible and upon which they are highly dependent.
National Fisheries Agencies should be encouraged to specify and report budgetary and manpower allocations for sustainable coastal fisheries management.
National coastal fisheries management allocations can be used as an indicator against aspirational targets such as investment per value of production or area managed.
Low resourcing of sustainable management is particularly alarming in the lesser developed countries with projected near-term deficits in coastal fish production
• More than 84% of the region’s population reside in countries projected to experience a deficit in the supply of coastal fish for food security, a further 11% in countries projected to experience a deficit.
• The lack of sustainable management investment gives rise to grave concerns when the impact of projected deficits in fish supply on predominantly fisheries dependent subsistence populations in lesser developed countries.
Adequate support for sustainable coastal fisheries management must be ensured in lesser developed countries and requires particularly urgent attention from donors and political leaders
Despite encouraging progress in community-based fisheries management there is a long way to go
• More than 900 communities are documented as implementing Community-Based Fisheries Management (CBFM) though over half of those are Fiji and Samoa alone.
• It is unclear to what extent CBFM occurs in villages that have not been surveyed by government or NGOs but more than 90% of the over 11,422 coastal villages do not appear to be receiving support to implement CBFM.
• Insufficient information is available to determine the effectiveness of most reported sites or the extent to which CBFM occurs autonomously in the remaining villages.
Governments should ascertain the extent to which CBFM effectively occurs and determine the most cost-effective strategies to support, extend and sustain these practices.
Coastal fisheries in the South Pacific are reviewed, including descriptions of fisheries, catch composition, catch rates and fisheries biology studies conducted on target stocks. The most widely targeted coastal fish stocks are reef fishes and coastal pelagic fishes. The total coastal fisheries production from the region amounts to just over 100 000 tyr-1. About 80% of this production is from subsistence fishing.
The Framework for a Pacific Oceanscape (FPO) catalysed the declaration of large Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) (over 250,000 km) in Oceania. The scale of these Pacific Ocean Arcs’ is designed to address biodiversity loss and climate change that threaten crucial ecological and sociological functions. This paper critically examines the institutional capacity in Oceania to meet spatial marine protection targets under the Convention on Biological Diversity 1992 (CBD). It scrutinises the regional institutions for oceans governance and national institutional arrangements for the oldest and newest Arcs in Kiribati and Palau. Implementation of credible and functional Arcs depends on enforcing the elimination of extractive activities to produce beneficial reserve effects. To meet the 2020 CBD marine spatial protection target will require support from all institutional members and better integration of coastal community governance.
An examination of the role and relevance of international bureaucracies in global environmental governance.
International bureaucracies—highly visible, far-reaching actors of global governance in areas that range from finance to the environment—are often derided as ineffective, inefficient, and unresponsive. Yet despite their prominence in many debates on world politics, little scholarly attention has been given to their actual influence in recent years. Managers of Global Change fills this gap, offering conceptual analysis and case studies of the role and relevance of international bureaucracies in the area of environmental governance—one of the most institutionally dynamic areas of world politics. The book seeks to resolve a puzzling disparity: although most international bureaucracies resemble each other in terms of their institutional and legal settings (their mandate, the countries to which they report, their general function), the roles they play and their actual influence vary greatly. The chapters investigate the type and degree of influence that international environmental bureaucracies exert and whether external or internal factors account for variations. After a discussion of theoretical context, research design, and empirical methodology, the book presents nine in-depth case studies of bureaucracies ranging from the environment department of the World Bank to the United Nations' climate and desertification secretariats. Managers of Global Change points the way to a better understanding of the role of international bureaucracies, which could improve the legitimacy of global decision making and resolve policy debates about the reform of the United Nations and other bodies.
The governance of climate change is in flux. In the understandable rush to explore what is filling the governance gaps created by gridlock in the international regime, scholars risk under-appreciating the capacity of states to engage in policy innovation at national and sub-national levels. Based on a review of existing concepts and theoretical explanations for (in)action at this level, we make the case for adopting a more holistic approach to understanding policy innovation, covering the source of new policy elements (‘invention’), their wider entry into use (‘diffusion’), and their projected and/or real effects (‘evaluation’). The analytical and methodological challenges that arise from integrating these three perspectives are systematically explored and integrated into a new analytical framework used in the other contributions to this volume to explore more fully the politics of invention, diffusion, and evaluation in specific areas of mitigation and adaptation policy.
While the case for rapid reductions in greenhouse gas emissions is compelling, actions being taken by most senior decision makers (SDMs) in government and business compound the problem. Given the systemic reach of much senior decision making, including decisions that constrain their own actions, there is an urgent need to open up the SDM black box. Focused on Western governments and multinational corporations, this article examines a cross‐disciplinary range of literature to ask: What are the key factors affecting the preparedness of SDMs—particularly those who accept the climate science—to take the decisive actions needed to drive rapid and significant emission reductions? The review brings together multiple perspectives on the many compounding factors operating across three interconnected scales: micro (individual and interpersonal factors including disciplinary background, worldview, gender, and risk perceptions); meso (network, organizational and institutional factors including management paradigms, organizational culture, and institutional complexity); and macro (environmental, social, cultural, political, and economic factors including climatic extremes, vested interests, and public opinion). It concludes that SDMs are strongly focused on their ‘local’ professional context and near‐term pressures, including reputation among peers, relationships with competitors, and real‐time financial status. As a group they exist within a largely closed circuit and perceive the world from a particular narrow perspective. Combined with the complexity and embedded character of existing systems, this occludes more systemic or reflexive thinking or action. This deep propensity for inaction suggests that a coordinated multi‐frontal approach is essential for a new more effective mitigation approach. WIREs Clim Change 2014, 5:753–773. doi: 10.1002/wcc.305
This article is categorized under: Perceptions, Behavior, and Communication of Climate Change > Behavior Change and Responses
Much of the diffusion literature in international relations, international political economy, and comparative public policy focuses on explaining patterns of convergence among states, international organizations, and transnational organizations. This literature suggests that full or complete convergence is not a necessary or even likely outcome of diffusion processes. However, as of yet, findings of varying degrees of convergence remain largely context‐specific and a more general and systematic review of the mechanisms explaining “how much” convergence occurs is still missing. To address this gap, this article offers a state‐of‐the‐art review of studies describing and explaining the phenomenon. On that basis, we trace the occurrence of varying degrees of convergence back to differences in (i) the nature of the underlying diffusion model; (ii) the specificity of the diffusion item; (iii) the type of diffusion mechanism in operation; and (iv) the institutional context at the point of adoption.
The Great Recession, Euro contagion, Middle East upheavals, nuclear proliferation, and expansion of rights, among others, highlight the centrality of diffusion to international studies. This Presidential Address outlines building blocks for a shared conceptualization of diffusion that is attentive to the initial stimulus; the medium through which information about the stimuli may/may not travel to other destinations; the political agents un/affected by the stimulus' positive or negative externalities, who aid or block the stimulus' journey to other destinations; and outcomes that enable discrimination among grades of diffusion and resulting equilibria. Various issue areas illustrate how initial stimuli may/may not change preferences, transform identities, trigger emotions, alter strategic choices, and affect outcomes. I advance three related considerations. First, to avoid selection bias, understanding what does not diffuse (the "Vegas counterfactual") should be as central as what does. Concepts such as firewatts and sedimentation are essential for gauging a medium's relative immunity/vulnerability to diffusion. Second, weaving domestic, regional, and global considerations into a single analytical framework reduces omitted variable bias and enables systematic cross-regional comparisons. Third, these building blocks imbue the study of diffusion with political dynamics—entailing strategic interaction, contingency, incomplete information, and unintended effects—that defy determinism, automaticity, or teleology. Similar causal mechanisms may yield different outcomes under different domestic, regional, and global conditions. And different mechanisms may yield similar outcomes under comparable circumstances. I highlight the challenges inherent in assessing the outcomes of diffusion given competing empirical findings, epistemologies, and normative readings of what does/does not and should/should not diffuse, and outline an agenda for future research.
Political scientists, sociologists, and economists have all sought to analyze the spread of economic and political liberalism across countries in recent decades. This article documents this diffusion of liberal policies and politics and proposes four distinct theories to explain how the prior choices of some countries and international actors affect the subsequent behavior of others: coercion, competition, learning, and emulation. These theories are explored empirically in the symposium articles that follow. The goal of the symposium is to bring quite different and often isolated schools of thought into contact and communication with one another, and to define common metrics by which we can judge the utility of the contending approaches to diffusion across different policy domains.For helpful comments on an earlier draft of this article, the authors wish to thank Barry Eichengreen, Lisa Martin, and John Meyer. Nancy Brune and Alexander Noonan provided excellent research assistance. The authors also wish to acknowledge and thank the Yale Center for International and Area Studies, the UCLA International Institute, and the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs at Harvard University for funding conferences at which this collection of symposium papers were discussed.
The travel of policy ideas across countries is a widely acknowledged phenomenon.Conventional approaches to the study of this process hinge on concepts such as ‘policy transfer’, ‘policy diffusion’, ‘lesson-drawing’ and ‘institutional isomorphism’. These approaches are influential in understanding public policy; however, they assume perfect rationality of actors, the stability of governance scales and the immutability of policy ideas in their travel.I propose policy translation as a new approach to counter these shortcomings and study the travel of policy ideas in order to shed light on pertaining policy questions, such as whether the travel of policy ideas may be navigated, and if so, how. I illustrate the relevance andvalue of policy translation with a case study from the water sector in Turkey.
Coherence has become the buzzword in EU studies. However, what exactly is policy coherence and how is it advanced by EU law? This article attempts to bridge the political science and legal debate on this ambiguous term. First, it critically analyses notions on coherence and consistency to find common ground in the seemingly confusing academic debate. On this basis, this article subsequently enquires into the promotion of these different notions by EU law. The focus is on the EU's external relations; arguably the most salient area for policy coherence in EU governance. The article argues that the theoretical debate sometimes lacks cross-fertilization and that conceptual fuzziness persists. The conceptual groundwork allows for analysing how primary law, and especially its interpretation by the Court, advances consistency and coherence in different ways. Albeit also marked by underdeveloped conceptual clarity, the Court's case law shows that several duties in EU law reinforce consistency and coherence in EU external relations.
One billion people around the world rely upon fish as their primary and in many cases, their only source of protein. At the same time, increasing demand from wealthier populations in the U.S. and Europe encourages dangerous overfishing practices along coastal waters. 'Fish for Life' addresses the problem of overfishing at local, national, and global levels as part of a comprehensive governance approach - one that acknowledges the critical intersection of food security, environmental protection, and international law in fishing practices throughout the world.
In June 2014, FAO member-states endorsed the Voluntary Guidelines for Securing
Sustainable Small-Scale Fisheries (SSF Guidelines). These Guidelines are one of the most
significant landmarks for small-scale fisheries around the world. They are comprehensive
in terms of topics covered, and progressive, with their foundations based on human rights
and other key principles. It can be anticipated that implementing the SSF Guidelines,
whether at local, national, or regional levels, will be challenging. This book contains
in-depth case studies where authors discuss the extent to which the Guidelines can
help improve the realities of small-scale fishing men and women globally and make
their livelihoods and communities more secure. This will require policy intervention
and innovation, along with contributions of civil society organizations and academia.
However, most of all it will necessitate the empowerment of fishing people so that they
can become active participants in decision making on matters where their well-being
and human rights are at stake. By endorsing the SSF Guidelines, states have committed
themselves to support and facilitate this development. This book asks whether states can
successfully “walk the talk,” and provides advice as to how they can do so.
Climate governance in Small Island developing States (SIDS) is a pressing priority to preserve livelihoods, biodiversity and ecosystems for the next generations. Understanding the dynamics of climate change policy integration is becoming more crucial as we try to measure the success of environmental governance efforts and chart new goals for sustainable development. At the international level, climate change policy has evolved from single issue to integrated approaches towards achieving sustainable development. New actors, new mechanisms and institutions of governance with greater fragmentation in governance across sectors and levels (. Biermann and Pattberg, 2008) make integration of policy in the area of climate change governance even more of a challenge today. What is the Caribbean reality regarding policy coherence in climate change governance? Are the same climate change policy coherence frameworks useful or indeed applicable for environmental governance in developing states more generally and for SIDS in particular? What are the best triggers to achieve successful climate change policy integration in environmental governance-especially as the complex interconnectivity of new actors, institutions and mechanisms make the process of integration even more challenging? What facilitates and what hampers climate policy integration in the regional Caribbean context? This article reviews the debates around policy coherence for climate change governance, creates a framework to test or measure policy coherence and examines how relevant this has been to regional climate change governance processes in Commonwealth Caribbean States. The study found that though at the regional level, there is substantial recognition of the importance of and mechanics involved in climate policy coherence, this has not translated to policy coherence at the regional and national levels. There is a large degree of fragmentation in the application of climate policy in each Caribbean Island with no mechanism to breach the gap. Silos in public environmental governance architectures, unwillingness to share data, insufficient political will; unsustainable project-based funding and lack of accountability among actors are the main challenges to climate policy coherence. The findings fill a gap in the literature on the elements of climate policy coherence from a SIDS perspective.
This article discusses learning in public policy and aims to take stock of the different ways of thinking about learning in public policy. It examines the literature on convergence and diffusion between countries, which is important for distinguishing learning from other processes of development. The next topic discussed is Heclo's landmark study of political learning, which is described as 'collective puzzling'. A third and different literature about learning as part of the ordinary business or practice of policy making is introduced. The article concludes with some reflections about the role of comparison in the process of learning across space and time.
Over the last few years a fast-growing literature has developed around the notion of sociotechnical transitions and the possibilities for governing 'system innovations' towards sustainability. Government policies are assumed to play an important role in such processes. However, an important critique has suggested not to see these transition processes as politically neutral but to pay more attention to the politics of these processes. With this paper I make a contribution towards this debate by analysing the underlying political processes and their institutional contexts which led to two quite different approaches aimed at promoting system innovations in the UK and the Netherlands. The main question I answer is why the two governments engage with the same challenge in such different ways. Building on a discursive-institutionalist perspective based on the work of Hajer and Schmidt, I highlight the interplay of discourses, institutional contexts, and interests in shaping policy initiatives to promote system innovations. I conclude by suggesting a typology of possible relation- ships between these variables and expected policy outputs which helps to explain the two case studies and is believed to be applicable more widely.
There is increasing international demand by policymakers focussed on Reduction of Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation for developing countries to conserve forests in the face of pressure from agriculture and energy demands. Improving forest conservation efforts requires a better understanding of how policies influence forest resources management, hence a need for better analysis of policy coherence and interaction. This study employs a content analysis of national sectoral policies in agriculture, energy and forestry, and national programmes under United Nations Rio conventions in Zambia to examine coherence and interplay between international- and national-level policies. Results show positive horizontal interplay between energy and forestry policies, while conflicts were observed between the agricultural and forestry policies despite the potential of conservation farming to provide a mutually supportive link. Policy documents show inconsistencies between national sectoral policies and national statements to the Rio conventions. Additionally, although national statements to Rio conventions share common ground on measures to address deforestation, they seem to be poorly mainstreamed into national policies and broader development policies at national level. Findings have further revealed a lack of coherence between national commitments to Rio conventions and national forest legislation. The paper concludes that although developing countries, such as Zambia, are ratifying international environmental conventions, measures are often not drafted into national policies and linkages remain largely superficial.
To what extent do international organizations, global policy networks, and transnational policy entrepreneurs influence domestic policy makers? Have we entered a new phase of globalization that, unbeknownst to most citizens, shapes policies that used to be the sole domain of domestic politics? Privatizing Pensions reveals how international institutions--such as the World Bank, USAID, and other transnational policy actors--have played a seminal role in the development, diffusion, and implementation of new pension reforms that are transforming the postwar social contract in more than thirty countries worldwide, including the United States. Mitchell Orenstein shows how transnational actors have driven change in a policy area once thought to be beyond reform in many countries, and how they have done so by deploying their unique resources and legitimacy to promote new ideas, recruit disciples worldwide, and provide a broad range of technical assistance to government reformers over the long term. He demonstrates that while domestic decision makers may retain veto power over these reforms--which replace traditional social security with individual pension savings accounts--transnational policy makers play the role of "proposal actors," shaping the information, preferences, and resources of their domestic clients. Privatizing Pensions argues that even the most quintessentially domestic areas of policy have been thoroughly globalized, and that these international influences must be better understood.
This is a short response to Benson and Jordan's 2011 article, ‘What Have We Learned from Policy Transfer Research?’ Its point of departure is their claim that ‘policy transfer is a useful concept that transfers easily across different sub‐disciplines and analytical contexts’. In reviewing a growing heterogeneous body of work on policy assemblages, mobilities and mutations, we argue that policy transfer research has already travelled well beyond political science, that it has been critiqued and modified along the way, and that its future is an interdisciplinary one; a future in which we invite political scientists to join.
What happens to policy innovations after they have been adopted? What factors account for subsequent changes to these policies? These are the research questions guiding this study on the spread of and subsequent changes to limit values for nitrogen oxide emissions from large combustion plants. By comparing the processes of diffusion and follow-up policy changes, we assess whether and how policy innovations translate into policy making. In so doing, we build on the literature on the determinants of policy diffusion and transfer. We employ original data on instances of policy adoption and policy change in 24 Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries over a period of thirty years (1976–2005). The data are analysed using semi-parametric event-history models. Our empirical findings show that both international and domestic factors account for the observed variation in our data regarding both first-time adoptions and post-adoption modifications. The results reveal that the subsequent tightening of emission standards faces greater obstacles than their mere diffusion (i.e., policy adoption). While international factors and supranational integration appear to impede the subsequent tightening of existing policies, international peer pressure is a strong predictor of an on-going regulatory commitment. Overall, adoption and accommodation processes seem to follow distinctive patterns, suggesting that a promising strategy in policy innovation research would involve differentiation between the first-time adoption and subsequent modification of policies.
Transitions towards more sustainable societies involve policy changes cutting across multiple sectors. Ideally, policies targeting different sectors create a coherent push for the adoption of more sustainable solutions. Sustainability transition studies have, however, paid little attention to the role of policy interaction across different policy domains. By focusing on biogas production in Finland and by further developing the technological innovation systems functions in connection to policy coherence, this paper examines how policy coherence is related to triggering transition from the perspective of biogas actors. The results demonstrate how supportive policies in one sector are made inefficient by unsupportive policies, instruments and practices in others. However, the lack of policy coherence, especially at the local level, may also have innovation-triggering influence when it forces actors to consider unconventional solutions. Thus the innovation effects of policy coherence are difficult to foresee and require an actor-focused perspective for analysis.
This paper presents a framework for analysing policy coherence in a European Union setting through the perspective of policy interaction. Building on a simple policy-analytical approach and theories of institutional interaction, the framework develops a three-step analytical approach, consisting of the inventory of policy objectives, the screening matrix and a more in-depth analysis of key interactions. Central to the analytical framework is the identification of synergy and conflict at three levels: policy objectives, policy instruments and implementation practices, also taking into account as far as possible outcome and impacts. The paper presents illustrative examples from EU renewable energy and cohesion policies in relation to different environmental policy areas such as biodiversity, habitats, resource efficiency and water. It finds that policies are often coherent at the level of objectives, but that associated instruments and in particular implementation practices cause concern for policy conflict in all three examples. Finally, the paper identifies emerging challenges in the application of policy coherence analysis and a need for further development of the analytical approach. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment
This article explores institutional diffusion in international environmental governance, specifying the conditions under which an existing set of institutions provides a template for new institutions. Prior institutional experiences can help to resolve bargaining problems, reduce transaction costs and provide information about likely performance. The authors discuss five examples of institutional diffusion in international environmental affairs and outline some causal mechanisms and conditions that facilitate or block the diffusion of institutional characteristics. As a baseline analysis, founded on assumptions that abstract from politics, a functional argument is developed about the conditions under which mimetic diffusion, reflecting a pattern of imitation, can occur. Although the focus in this short article is on this functional argument, the authors recognize that state interests and power, ideology, and private interests also play significant roles in facilitating or inhibiting institutional diffusion in international environmental affairs.
The past two decades have seen a wealth of papers on policy diffusion and policy transfer. In the first half, this paper reviews some of the trends in the literature by looking backwards to the political science diffusion literature, and forwards to the expanding multi-disciplinary social science literatures on policy ‘learning’, ‘mobilities’ and ‘translation’ which qualify many of the rationalist assumptions of the early diffusion/transfer literatures. These studies stress the complexity of context that modifies exports of policy and the need for interpretation or experimentalism in the assemblage of policy. The second half of the paper focuses on role of international organisations and non-state actors in transnational transfer in the spread of norms, standard setting and development of professional communities or networks that promote harmonisation and policy coordination. The ‘soft’ transfer of ideas and information via networks whether they be personal, professional or electronic is rapid and frequent. It is rather more infrequent to see such ideas structure governance and become institutionalised. Knowledge transfer is more extensive than policy transfer.
The Pacific Islands community is committed to protecting the quality of life of its people and the integrity of the environment with which island life is inextricably intertwined. It would, however, be impossible for Pacific Island Countries to cope individually with the common regional issues and the increased impact of global climate and economic problems. The support of the various regional organisations, strengthened further by inter-agency collaboration under the Council of Regional Organisations of the Pacific is critical to success.Use of a regional approach to develop strategic responses to issues has many advantages: sharing of high investment or establishment costs for capital intensive activities; augmenting capacity or capability constraints that arise in small populations, economies of scale in the provision of centralised training services; better formulation of policies or activities that have transboundary “spill-over” or “mutually reinforcing” impacts; and most critically—a stronger voice in global fora.
Community-based fisheries management is being widely promoted as an alternative to centralized systems based on the familiar bioeconomic models that have manifestly failed to prevent a near catastrophic overexploitation of fish stocks worldwide. The Pacific Island Region probably contains the world’s greatest concentration of still-functioning traditional community-based systems for managing coastal-marine fisheries and other resources.It has been frequently asserted that many such traditional systems provide both a firm foundation for future coastal fisheries management in the Pacific Islands Region, as well as a conceptual framework for managing fisheries elsewhere. Although now seemingly self-evident to fisheries development “experts”, such assertions remain largely unverified.Whereas it is a relatively straightforward task to distil basic “design principles” from a sample of systems, it is far more complex to analyze the multi-sectoral national environment in which they function, especially when their history is taken into account. In other words, it is far less widely appreciated that many contemporary community-based fisheries management systems are the end products of a long process of change and adaptation to external pressures and constraints.In this article I address some of the broader contextual issues that should be appreciated in policymaking with respect to a potential modern role for traditional management systems in general, and in the analysis of a future role for any given system. First, the principal external factors that have caused change in systems are described and exemplified. The recognition of the potential role of existing community-based fisheries systems, and attempts to act on it, is summarized for some Pacific Island nations, with a focus on the complex problem of reconciling customary and statutory legal systems. In the final section I examine three principal national policy alternatives regarding the potential role of existing local fisheries management systems, together with three main criteria for determining whether or not a system can be adapted to fulfill modern requirements.
The inhabitants of Oceania traditionally obtained 90% of their animal protein from the sea; terrestrial food supplies were limited and often precarious. Deliberate marine conservation measures were characteristic, such as closed seasons, size selection and allowing a portion of the catch to escpae. The impact of westernization was such that a money economy was introduced, traditional authority broke down, and new laws and practices were imposed by colonial powers. Although there may soon be a return to economic and nutritional self-sufficiency, the traditional island conservation ethic will continue to be eroded as long as capitalist economies dominate in these Pacific islands. -P.J.Jarvis
The analysis of public policy has recently been characterized by the development of an approach which emphasizes the influence of cognitive and normative elements in public policy - making. The main purpose of this article is to offer a critical review of different models related to this approach, based on notions of paradigm, of advocacy coalition , or of the référentiel . In spite of some differences, these conceptualizations all shed light on the influence of 'world views', mechanisms of identity formation, principles of action in public policy analysis. These models, separate from those informed by a rationalist position, are also capable of explaining the processes of 'extraordinary' change in public policy. However,an excessive emphasis on cognitive and normative variables has sometimes underestimated the forms of mobilization to which these frames are subject. This article tries to integrate certain neglected variables: the interests of actors, and the role of institutions.
This paper proposes a framework for analysing domestic factors behind policy diffusion and convergence. Three basic factors are distinguished, determining the extent to which countries are likely to take up different types of new policies. These factors are: culture, institutions and economy. They are operationalized with the help of three indicators: dominant religious tradition (culture), the prevailing orientation towards public/private relations (institutions), and the level of economic development (economy). It is argued that these factors may be important to different degrees, dependent on whether policy change involves the basic goals and ideas of a policy, the instruments applied, or the setting or calibration' of these instruments. This leads to the hypothesis that countries that are culturally, institutionally or economically close may be expected to adopt similar ideas, instruments or settings in public policy, respectively, and thus are likely to converge on these points. While the argument proposed in this paper applies to policy change generally, we focus on environmental policy for illustration.