Policy

There is a growing recognition that the fisheries policies of the past have been driven primarily by environmental and economic research agendas. This may have been due to the influence of the more powerful actors in the fisheries policy debate: foreign governments, conservation organizations, the scientific establishment, development bodies, and finance institutions.

Where access to renewable natural resources essential to rural livelihoods is highly contested, improving cooperation in resource management is an important element in strategies for peacebuilding and conflict prevention. While researchers have made advances in assessing the role of environmental resources as a causal factor in civil conflict, analysis of the positive potential of collective natural resource management efforts to reduce broader conflict is less developed.

Armitage, D. ; Béné, C. ; Charles, A.T. ; Johnson, D. ; Allison, E.H. Ecology and Society 17(4): 15 2012

Innovative combinations of social and ecological theory are required to deal with complexity and change in human-ecological systems. We examined the interplay and complementarities that emerge by linking resilience and social well-being approaches. First, we reflected on the limitations of applying ecological resilience concepts to social systems from the perspective of social theory, and particularly, the concept of well-being. Second, we examined the interplay of resilience and well-being concepts in fostering a social-ecological perspective that promises more appropriate management and policy actions. We examined five key points of interplay: (1) the limits of optimization thinking (e.g., maximum sustainable yield), (2) the role of human agency and values, (3) understandings of scale, (4) insights on “controlling variables,” and (5) perspectives on thresholds and boundaries. Based on this synthesis, we offer insights to move incrementally towards interdisciplinary research and governance for complex social-ecological systems.