Collaborative Research: Marine Spatial Planning and the Role of Community and Environmental Actors

该项目将调查海洋空间规划是如何演变并继续作为美国的主要海洋政策颁布的。海洋空间规划(MSP)是一种新兴的海洋治理进程，旨在解决当前对如何组织和利用国家海洋资源的关切。MSP是美国联邦政府国家海洋政策的核心组成部分，也是政府实现基于生态系统的海洋管理承诺的关键途径。海洋环境是越来越多的用户和活动的家园，MSP正在努力将其纳入一个全面的规划进程。理解海洋管理进程是在海洋战略文件范围内产生的，这对于维持沿海社区及其许多社区赖以生存的海洋资源至关重要。该项目将调查新出现的海洋科学计划政策是如何产生的，特别侧重于被称为多用途海洋地籍的联邦地理空间数据库在为海洋空间决策建立制图基础方面的作用。该项目将审查MSP的国家政策演变，MMC在继续制定MSP方面发挥的作用，以及这些进程对使沿海社区、经济和社会结构或多或少适应环境变化的影响。这项研究将利用行动者网络理论、关键地理信息科学(GIS)和政治生态学来解决以下问题：1)MSP如何成为美国首选的海洋政策解决方案(例如，对于渔业、能源或水产养殖问题)？2)哪些类型的信息(例如，科学、经济、社会)为MSP话语提供信息，这些信息是如何传递给公众的？3)MSP工具(如MMC)是如何构成(评估、衡量和代表)社区和环境行为者的，它们可能通过这些工具积累或失去哪些能力？为了回答这些问题，该项目将收集和分析与MSP有关的政府机构、非政府组织、行业团体和公共论坛的书面和音频记录。此外，该项目将收集和分析MMC的来源数据和产出，并对MMC进行简短的组织人种学。预计项目结果将有助于阐明MSP过程，并为改进这一新的海洋管理方法提供参考。该项目将分析MSP中纳入了哪些类型的人类和海洋资源信息，这是研究人员和政策制定者推进旨在可视化和组织美国海洋使用的越来越大的数据集的关键需求。该项目将切实促进对海洋管理的理解，同时帮助在全国各地社区参与以不同方式定义海洋空间的倡议(例如，水产养殖、渔获量份额、风能)时，向MSP提供信息。更广泛地说，全世界对海洋治理的新形式产生了前所未有的兴趣，“海洋议程”已成为国家和国际论坛的中心议题。尽管这项研究将重点放在美国，但结果将对这些更大的过程具有重要意义。因此，这项研究的更广泛影响与政策进程的范围有关，这些政策进程将改写美国和其他地方的海洋治理。该项目实现这些影响的能力源于它与参与这些决策进程的关键人员和机构的联系，以及私营部门以前对海洋政策辩论的研究和贡献。其他影响将包括培训一名博士生，指导一名博士后研究人员，以及加强合作者之间的学术网络。

This project will investigate how Marine Spatial Planning has evolved and continues to be enacted as the principal ocean policy in the United States. Marine Spatial Planning (MSP) is an emerging process of ocean governance that seeks to address current concerns with how to organize and use the nation's marine resources. MSP is a central component of the US federal government's National Ocean Policy, and is the key avenue through which the government's commitment to ecosystem-based management of the oceans will be realized. The marine environment is home to a growing number of users and activities that MSP is working to frame within a comprehensive planning process. Understanding the process of ocean governance as produced within the context of MSP is critical to sustaining coastal communities and the marine resources many of them depend on. This project will investigate how emerging MSP policies are produced, focusing particularly on the role of the federal geospatial database known as the Multipurpose Marine Cadastre (MMC) in creating a cartographic basis for marine spatial decision-making. The project will examine the national policy evolution of MSP, what role the MMC plays in the continuing formulation of MSP, and the implications of these processes for making coastal communities, economies, and social structures more or less resilient to environmental changes. This research will draw on actor-network theory, critical Geographical Information Science (GIS), and political ecology to address the following questions: 1) How has MSP emerged as the preferred ocean policy solution (e.g., for fisheries, energy, or aquaculture questions) in the United States? 2) What types of information (e.g., scientific, economic, social) inform MSP discourses, and how is such information being transmitted to the public? 3) How are communities and environmental actors constituted (assessed, measured, represented) by MSP tools such as the MMC, and what capacities might they accumulate or lose through such tools? To answer these questions, the project will collect and analyze written and audio records from government agencies, non-government organizations, industry groups, and public forums concerned with MSP. Further, the project will collect and analyze source data and outputs from the MMC, and conduct a short organizational ethnography of the MMC. Project results are expected to help illuminate MSP processes and to inform strategies for improving this new method of oceans governance.This project will analyze what types of human and marine resource information is being incorporated into MSP, a critical need as researchers and policymakers move forward with ever-larger data sets designed to visualize and organize US ocean uses. The project will contribute practically to the understanding of ocean management, while helping to inform MSP practices as communities across the country engage with initiatives (e.g., aquaculture, catch shares, wind energy) that define ocean space in different ways. More generally, there is unprecedented worldwide interest in new forms of ocean governance, and the 'oceans agenda' has emerged as a central topic in both national and international forums. Although this research will focus on the US, results will have significance for these larger processes. Thus, the broader impact of this research is related to the scope of the policy processes that stand to rewrite ocean governance in the US and elsewhere. The project's ability to realize these impacts arises through its connections to key people and institutions involved in these policy-making processes, as well as the PIs' previous research on and contributions to ocean policy debates. Additional impacts will include the training of a PhD student, the mentoring of a post-doctoral researcher, and strengthened academic networks amongst the collaborators.