The ontological politics of marine spatial planning: Assembling the ocean and shaping the capacities of ‘Community’ and ‘Environment’

Boucquey, Noëlle; Fairbanks, Luke; Martin, Kevin St.; Campbell, Lisa M.; McCay, Bonnie J.

doi:10.1016/j.geoforum.2016.06.014

Cited by 95 publications

(62 citation statements)

References 72 publications

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“…MSP uncritically focuses on producing managerial-technological fixes for intricate socio-political issues, and the discourse within MSP processes is progressively dominated by neoliberal logic [22]. The complex web of social-ecological relations in the marine environment is increasingly inscribed through mapping technologies [23] and captured in geospatial databases [24], creating problematic notions of fixity [25]. These databases are analysed by scientific and technocratic experts to make 'rational' decisions about issues that have been disembedded from their social contexts [26].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exclusion and non-participation in Marine Spatial Planning

2018

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Marine Spatial Planning (MSP) offers the possibility of democratising management of the seas. MSP is, however, increasingly implemented as a form of post-political planning, dominated by the logic of neoliberalism, and a belief in the capacity of managerialtechnological apparatuses to address complex socio-political problems, with little attention paid to issues of power and inequality. There is growing concern that MSP is not facilitating a paradigm shift towards publicly engaged marine management, and that it may simply repackage power dynamics in the rhetoric of participation to legitimise the agendas of dominant actors. This raises questions about the legitimacy and inclusivity of participatory MSP. Research on stakeholder engagement within MSP has predominately focused on assessing experiences of active MSP participants and has not evaluated the democratic or inclusive nature of these processes. Adopting the Northeast Ocean Planning initiative in the US as a case study, this paper provides the first study of exclusion and non-participation of stakeholders in an MSP process. Three major issues are found to have had an impact on exclusion and non-participation: poor communication and a perception that the process was deliberately exclusionary; issues arising from fragmented governance, territorialisation and scale; and lack of specificity regarding benefits or losses that might accrue from the process.To be effective, participatory MSP practice must: develop mechanisms that recognise the complexity of socio-spatial relationships in the marine environment; facilitate participation in meaningful spatial decision-making, rather than in post-ideological, objective-setting processes; and create space for debate about the very purpose of MSP processes.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exclusion and non-participation in Marine Spatial Planning

2018

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“…It was not until most recently that the call by Ritchie and Ellis (2010: 717) for 'more theoretically-driven, post-positivist forms of [MSP] research', has begun to be heeded, by way of work by Boucquey et al (2016). Articulating the categories of "ontological politics" and "assemblages", Boucquey et al (2016: 3) approach the practice of MSP, especially its techno-managerial data-gathering and map-making exercise as constituting an 'art of government'. Recognizing that 'governance projects to measure and organize socio-natural spaces have often resulted in the marginalization of human communities', they insist that the 'focus of analysis then becomes […] how and why particular assemblages emerge and function as they do' (Boucquey et al, 2016: 3).…”

Section: Introduction and Aimsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Taking power to sea: Towards a post-structuralist discourse theoretical critique of marine spatial planning

Tafon

2017

Environment and Planning C: Politics and Space

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Responding to calls for a more theoretically-driven, post-positivist and radical Marine Spatial Planning (MSP) research that approaches the policy as a political project, this paper develops a political discourse theory approach to critical MSP. Elaborating radical contingency as an ontological condition of social life, which points to the ineradicability of power and conflict in MSP social relations, the paper problematizes MSP as constituting politics, or key practices that attempt to organize human co-existence and thus, conceal this radical contingency. These practices (e.g. ecosystem-based management, participation, planning regulation and the organization of socio-natural spaces), whose outcomes are far from adaptive, consensual or neutral are discussed as sites of "politics" that effectively marginalize particular groups of people and "herd" their participation and ways of knowing toward achieving limited policy outcomes. Drawing on the MSP Directive, the paper further teases out how specific narratives and rhetorical signifiers around "integrating" and "balancing" potentially irreconcilable sustainable development objectives may interpellate particular stakeholders in ways that render them ideologically complicitous in sustaining, rather than challenging, neoliberal logics of managerialism and economic maximization of marine resources. But in tune with the ontological condition of the social as radically contingent, the paper discusses how and why participatory spaces may constitute a potential space of contestation for marginalized voices and thus, reveal the political moment of Introduction and AimsConceptualized as a marine governance expression of sustainable development, Marine Spatial Planning (MSP) in the European Union (EU) has far reaching ambitions of tackling social, environmental and economic conflicts across EU seas by implementing ecosystem-based management (EBM). It is assumed that science-based knowledge and broad stakeholder participation will deliver rational, adaptive, holistic and consensual solutions to these conflicting interests and thus ensure the acceptance and effectiveness of planning decisions. The MSP literature over the years has emphasized the usefulness of EBM and participation for the integrated planning of balanced environmental protection and sustainable use of ocean and coastal resources.In a reformist, rather than critical approach, research has generally accepted the rationality and This argument stems from the unsettling assumption that participation among broad stakeholder groups can lead to equitable and consensual decisions and that the adaptiveness of EBM as a tool can facilitate objective decisions. Consider, still, the following assertions from prominent MSP scholars: 1) Ehler's (2012: 3) emphatic assertion that 'MSP is clearly an idea whose time has come'; 2) Douvere's (2008: 765) rather uncritical and unedifying observation that MSP is crucial because it '[f]ocuses on influencing the behavior of humans and their activities over time'; and 3) the un...

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“…Hence, little attention has been given to the role of what I will refer to in line with broadly as the environment of the market; that is, the totality of relations in which the boundaries of markets are materialized and reproduced. In line with recent developments in cultural geography that highlight the 'morethan-human' aspects of space by questioning the static territorial conceptions underlying modern resource management (Bear 2012, Probyn 2014, Cardwell and Thornton 2015, Boucquey et al 2016, Herman 2016, I therefore shift the attention to the 'fluid spaces' (Bear and Eden 2008) of the sea that tend to ignore human classifications and territorial boundaries in order to further decentralize economic action and capture the contingent situational dynamics underlying economic coping with the environment in modern market economies.…”

Section: Coping With the Environmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

The wrong fish: maneuvering the boundaries of market-based resource management

Dobeson

2018

Journal of Cultural Economy

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How can economic actors stay afloat in a highly volatile market environment? By drawing on ethnographic material from the Icelandic fishing industry, this article demonstrates how fishers maneuver the boundaries of market-based resource management that tend to ignore the ever-changing environment of the sea. The empirical material shows how fishers skillfully manipulate their socio-technical environment in order to adjust the market for so-called Individual Transferable Quotas (ITQs) with the movement of fish stocks. Accordingly, three coping practices are deployed: (i) tinkering with accounts, (ii) socio-technical conversion, and (iii) redefining boundaries. While these practices allow fishers to stay afloat, they are likewise undermined by the ever-changing environment of the sea, consequently fueling a money-induced cycle of socio-technical problem-solving and breakdowns.ARTICLE HISTORY

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The ontological politics of marine spatial planning: Assembling the ocean and shaping the capacities of ‘Community’ and ‘Environment’

Cited by 95 publications

References 72 publications

Exclusion and non-participation in Marine Spatial Planning

Exclusion and non-participation in Marine Spatial Planning

Taking power to sea: Towards a post-structuralist discourse theoretical critique of marine spatial planning

The wrong fish: maneuvering the boundaries of market-based resource management

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