Past-present discontinuity in ecological change and marine governance: An integrated narrative approach to artisanal fishing

Abstract

Today artisanal fishers working in Natura 2000 coastal protected sites face two major types of change: in marine resources, and the governance of their professions. Such transformations affect fishers' livelihoods, identities and traditions, yet little is known about how these professionals elaborate on these changesi.e., as continuities or discontinuities-in the narratives they produce as a group. Interviews and focus-groups with artisanal fishers and shellfish harvesters (n=36) from the Portuguese Southwest coast were subjected to a two-step analysis. First, a textual analysis with Iramuteq helped select the themes directly related to marine resources and governance. Second, three main narratives-on algae, barnacles and fish-were reconstructed. These were then explored regarding: (1) narrative formats (stability, regressive, progressive, mixed); (2) whether/how these formats elaborated changes as continuities or discontinuities; (3) the roles attributed to Self and Others, and whether and how these legitimized the laws, opening avenues for change; and (4) whether narratives were unified or fragmented. This study illustrates how transformations are presented through various combinations of narrative formats, sometimes mobilized to resist and other times to legitimate legal institutional change. It shows how institutional change can be integrated into local narratives as a positive contribution through a process that implies reconstructing the collective identity and local traditions. Through a narrative approach, this paper offers an integrated examination of fishers' concerns towards their professions and the laws regulating them, and provides useful insight into how and when marine governance is more/less likely to be legitimized.

Local People’s Appraisal of the Fishery-Seal Situation in Traditional Fishing Villages on the Baltic Sea Coast in Southeast Sweden

“…Unfortunately, coping potential did not seem to be supported by management authorities, as social trust was relatively low, lower than previously reported in relation to conflicts around terrestrial wildlife (Johansson et al 2012(Johansson et al , 2019a. Low social trust might be an expression of power asymmetries between fishers and governing institutions (Mouro, Santos, and Castro 2018). Conservation and management of marine wildlife must allow for solutions that could be adapted to place-specific solutions requiring local involvement, experience, and knowledge (IPBES 2019).…”

“…All over the world, coastal communities and traditional small-scale fisheries are experiencing an impact on recovering populations of marine mammals. This entails a conflict with prevailing conservation interests that frame population increases as successful management (Davis et al 2020;De Mar ıa, Barboza, and Szteren 2014;Mouro, Santos, and Castro 2018). Terrestrial wildlife species threatened by or threatening humans, and their activities, have received considerable attention (Dickman 2010), but the marine context of human-wildlife interaction is a relatively new field of study (Guerra 2019).…”

“…Although local people along the Russian coast ascribed a commercial value to salmon, they also attributed nonprofit meanings to salmon as an important aspect of the identity of fishing villages (Nakhshina 2012). Mouro, Santos, and Castro (2018) illustrated how ecological governance was consistently thought of as a threat to artisanal fishing due to perceived power asymmetries between fishers and governing institutions. Indeed, the protection of marine mammal species may result in unintended negative consequences for small-scale fisheries (Davis et al 2020).…”

A Dynamic View of Local Knowledge and Epistemic Bonds to Place

“…Drawing from these positions, I will now propose a dynamic model of local knowledge that argues that this overlap is indeed imperfect. I will illustrate two dimensions of this proposal -(1) knowledge as intertwining process and product, and (2) knowledge as learning and hybridisation through relationwith examples from farmers and fishers in studies conducted in Natura 2000 sites in Portugal (see methodological details in Castro and Santos, 2020;Mouro et al, 2018;Castro and Mouro, 2016). Together, the conceptual proposal and the examples will help to clarify the relevance of local knowledge and epistemic bonds for people-place relations, illustrating how, when mobilised to interpret Natura laws, these bonds are consequential for both resisting and integrating them.…”

Dialogues with the absent Other: Using reported speech and the vocabulary of citizenship for contesting ecological laws and institutions

“…In Natura sites, new legislation decides what activities professional groups – for example, fishers, farmers – are (and are not) permitted for the sake of species and habitats (Blicharska et al, 2016). Such professional groups have contested many of these legal innovations, getting involved in ‘battles of ideas’ criticizing, for instance, disregard of their local knowledge and of how it can be vital for the development of joint strategies for resource protection (Beunen et al, 2013; Blicharska et al, 2016; Jentoft, 2000; Martin et al, 2016; Mouro et al, 2018). Yet very few psycho-social analyses have so far explored these conflicts from their perspective (Castro, 2012), with most being principally attentive to the general public, or to non-professional groups (e.g.…”