Doctoral Dissertation Research: Knowledge, Networks, and the Spaces of Coral Reef Conservation

珊瑚礁被描述为遭受环境恶化速度最快的生态系统之一，特别是当位于人口中心附近或易于进行各种资源开发时。 全世界珊瑚礁的衰退速度促使人们加大了管理和保护力度，但这些努力收效甚微，因为关于哪些危及珊瑚礁生态系统的因素最需要解决、如何减轻这些因素以及如何衡量进展的辩论越来越激烈。 因此，珊瑚礁保护科学受到不确定性和相互竞争的政策处方的困扰，而采取行动的紧迫性继续升级，这体现了科学实践及其在环境政策中的应用的悖论：一方面，科学研究是由专业知识的分歧和不确定性推动的，但另一方面，实际的决策需要对离散的因果关系达成普遍一致。 指导这项工作的是这样一种信念，即目前在这个问题上的争论程度并不是因为缺乏关于珊瑚礁系统的科学知识，而是因为滥用和错误地强调科学上的不确定性，从而推动进一步的调查，并歪曲被普遍接受为事实的核心结论。 使用Q-方法，本论文的研究将表征珊瑚礁科学和保护的竞争知识的共同理解，并定量排名的主体和目标周围的政策。 社会网络分析将探讨如何科学的不确定性，燃料的辩论是沟通和发展的空间和概念网络，通过它们的流动。 将利用地理信息系统来确定关于珊瑚礁系统的具体争论可能起源于何处，以及对珊瑚礁衰退和减缓的看法在空间上如何根据进行科学研究的区域而变化。 这项研究将在南佛罗里达进行，那里不仅有一个经过充分研究的珊瑚礁区和既定的养护框架，而且也是几个对珊瑚礁养护感兴趣的学术、国际、政府和非政府组织的所在地，从而提供了一个强大的国际珊瑚礁科学家和决策者网络，他们将接受采访。通过研究科学家和政策制定者谈判科学不确定性的方式，这项研究具有很强的潜力，为环境决策工作提出新的途径，这些工作因缺乏共识而陷入瘫痪，这些网络声称共同的保护目标。 这项工作旨在确定如何克服阻碍有效减缓努力的科学不确定性，这在海洋环境中特别重要，因为在海洋环境中，科学研究异常昂贵，观察和取样技术取决于区域政治、生物和地球物理差异。 这项研究将产生一种可访问的方法，该方法将有助于快速准确地解构有争议的环境辩论，揭示支撑争论结构的科学范式的要点，并量化网络中的核心信念的程度。 在环境日益脆弱的时代，这项研究遇到了一些主要障碍，阻碍了将科学研究及时转化为有效的补救政策。

Coral reefs are described as among those ecosystems suffering the greatest rates of environmental deterioration, particularly when located near population centers or easily accessible to a variety of resource exploitation efforts. The rates of reef decline worldwide have spurred greater management and conservation efforts, but these have achieved little success as debates intensify over which factors endangering coral reef ecosystems are most important to address, how to mitigate them, and how to measure progress. Coral reef conservation science is thus beset by uncertainty and competing policy prescriptions, while the urgency for action continues to escalate, exemplifying a paradox in the practice of science and its application to environmental policy in general: on the one hand, scientific research is propelled by disagreement and uncertainty in specialized knowledges, yet on the other hand, practical policy-making requires general agreement about discrete causal relationships. Guiding this work is the belief that the current level of contention on this issue is due not to a lack of scientific knowledge about reef systems, but rather to a misuse and mis-emphasis of scientific uncertainties that drive further investigations and distort core conclusions that are generally accepted as fact. Using Q-Methodology, this dissertation research will characterize common understandings from competing knowledges of reef science and conservation, and quantitatively rank the subjectivities and goals surrounding policy. Social Network Analysis will be employed to explore how scientific uncertainties that fuel debates are communicated and evolve in the spatial and conceptual networks through which they flow. Geographic information systems (GIS) will be used to determine where particular contentions about reef systems may have originated and how perceptions of reef decline and mitigation are spatially contingent based on the region where the science is conducted. This research will take place in South Florida, which not only has a well-studied reef tract and established conservation frameworks, but also is home to several academic, international, governmental and non-governmental organizations interested in reef conservation thus providing a strong international network of reef scientists and policy-makers who will be available for interviews. By examining the ways in which scientists and policy-makers negotiate scientific uncertainty, this research has a strong potential to suggest new avenues for environmental policy-making efforts that have been paralyzed by a lack of consensus within networks that claim a common conservation goal. This work seeks to identify ways in which to surmount the scientific uncertainties that inhibit effective mitigation efforts, which are particularly important in marine environments where scientific research is exceptionally expensive and where observation and sampling techniques are contingent on regional political, biological, and geophysical differences. This research will result in an accessible methodology that will facilitate a way to quickly and accurately deconstruct contested environmental debates by revealing main points that underpin the scientific paradigms around which the contentions are structured, and quantify the degree to which those in the network agree on core beliefs. In a time of increasing environmental vulnerability, this research confronts some of the main obstacles that prevent the timely translation of scientific research into effective remediating policies.