A participatory scenario method to explore the future of marine social‐ecological systems

Abstract

Anticipating future changes in marine social‐ecological systems (MSES) several decades into the future is essential in the context of accelerating global change. This is challenging in situations where actors do not share common understandings, practices, or visions about the future. We introduce a dedicated scenario method for the development of MSES scenarios in a participatory context. The objective is to allow different actors to jointly develop scenarios which contain their multiple visions of the future. The method starts from four perspectives: “fisheries management,” “ecosystem,” “ocean climate,” and “global context and governance” for which current status and recent trends are summarized. Contrasted scenarios about possible futures are elaborated for each of the four single perspectives before being integrated into multiple‐perspective scenarios. Selected scenarios are then developed into storylines. Focusing on individual perspectives until near the end allows actors with diverse cultures, interests and horizons to confront their own notions of the future. We illustrate the method with the exploration of the futures of the Barents Sea MSES by 2050. We emphasize the following lessons learned: first, many actors are not familiar with scenario building and attention must be paid to explaining the purpose, methodology, and benefits of scenarios exercises. Second, although the Barents Sea MSES is relatively well understood, uncertainties about its future are significant. Third, it is important to focus on unlikely events. Fourth, all perspectives should be treated equally. Fifth, as MSES are continuously changing, we can only be prepared for future changes if we collectively keep preparing.

Contextualizing Scenarios to Explore Social-Ecological Futures: A Three Step Participatory Case Study for the Humboldt Current Upwelling System

“…However, as was shown above, the artisanal fishers did not make this connection during the FGDs. This connection shows, in line with other studies (Planque et al, 2019), a limit of many scenario processes, i.e., the tendency of participants to assume that being prepared for the future is linked to the capacity to predict the future. In a similar vein, it is usually assumed that a better understanding of the nexus between the elements and drivers of change leads to sustainability but the truth is that integrated analytical approaches that can be translated into coherent crosssectorial scale policies are often lacking (Yung et al, 2019).…”

Developing achievable alternate futures for key challenges during the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development

“…This trust building process was considered critically important, as although the project was initiated by an interdisciplinary research centre with existing collaborations across many disciplines, the Future Seas project developed new collaborations with philosophers, engineers and medical researchers. The early workshops allowed participants to develop awareness of their own, common and contrasting values and expectations regarding the future: “Thinking about the future is both universal (everyone thinks about the future) and personal (everyone thinks about it in their own way)” (p. 449 Planque et al 2019 ). This process of awareness building has been recognised as a critical process in Futures Literacy (Miller 2007 ).…”

“…At this workshop, participants also explored the meaning of a ‘More Sustainable’ future, such that a series of common objectives were identified for the ‘More Sustainable’ futures. Participants agreed that imagining a future that moved as far as possible towards the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) would be the core focus of the ‘More Sustainable’ Future in each Key Challenge, providing a broadly consistent, normative target across the Challenges (Börjeson et al 2006 ; Planque et al 2019 ). It was, however, made explicit among participants that the different Challenge teams were likely to have distinct starting perspectives.…”

“…Those differences were likely to manifest in variability in the importance placed on different SDGs and their constituent targets among the Key Challenges. Similarly, it was agreed that the anticipated, ‘Business-as-Usual’ scenario was to be based upon the current trajectory of trends into the future (Planque et al 2019 ), providing a broadly consistent predictive target for all the challenges (Börjeson et al 2006 ). It is acknowledged that this split into a predictive ‘Business-as-Usual’ versus a normative ‘More Sustainable’ future is somewhat arbitrary.…”

“…However, there is currently little guidance within the marine science literature on the process of developing narrative scenarios that combine a range of worldviews from within the scientific community and beyond. A notable exception is work by Planque et al ( 2019 ), which first details the development of separate future scenarios based on distinct perspectives and subsequently describes a process for the integration of these individual scenarios into multi-perspective, imagined futures. Nevertheless, their two-step approach does not allow for end-to-end interdisciplinary collaborations that integrate worldviews from the outset.…”