Developing equity-oriented data practices for small-scale fisheries

该奖项的全部或部分资金来自《2021年美国救援计划法案》(公法117-2)。该奖项是作为NSF社会、行为和经济学博士后研究奖学金(SPRF)计划的一部分提供的。SPRF计划的目标是为学术界、工业界或私营部门和政府的科学职业生涯培养有前途的、早期职业博士水平的科学家。SPRF奖项包括在知名科学家的赞助下进行两年的培训，并鼓励博士后研究员进行独立研究。国家科学基金会致力于促进科学界所有阶层的科学家参与其研究方案和活动，包括那些来自代表性不足的群体的科学家；博士后阶段被认为是实现这一目标的专业发展的一个重要水平。每个博士后研究员都必须解决推动各自学科领域向前发展的重要科学问题。在康奈尔大学珍妮·戈尔茨坦博士的赞助下，这一博士后奖学金奖项支持一位早期职业科学家，他研究在渔业科学和管理中整合新数据和技术的社会效益和障碍。过度捕捞威胁到全球渔业的可持续性，但据说减少捕捞影响的政策受到严重数据短缺的限制。相机和地理空间跟踪设备等数字技术已成为收集捕鱼活动数据的低成本工具。然而，尽管数据收集技术广泛扩散，但很少有研究审查开发和部署渔业数据所采用的关系做法。这项研究考察了非政府组织、渔民和其他环境治理行为者之间的数据共享做法，以了解数字渔业数据是如何收集、共享和应用于环境决策的。以前的研究集中在全球范围的环境数据网络上，而这项研究突出了收集和应用数据的日常具体实践以及全球和地方之间复杂的相互依存关系。该项目通过对蓝色经济中数据正义、性别和环境公平之间的联系进行理论化，并通过探索环境数据的性别经验，特别是在农村和以资源为基础的生计的背景下，在关键方面促进了知识的发展。这些成果有助于为赋予妇女权力的政策和体制做法提供信息，同时还可以利用技术提高渔业的可持续性。这项研究采用了一个新的数字渔业数据收集计划的多地点案例研究。这项研究提出三个问题：1)新的数据流和数据收集技术如何促进或限制渔业参与，特别是妇女的参与？2)数据基础设施和渔业管理战略的设计和发展如何相互促进？3)数据做法如何支持蓝色经济中的公平？研究目标是：i)探讨渔民和渔户妇女如何看待数字渔业数据、其作用、重要性和价值，特别是与其捕鱼生计有关的数据；ii)评估渔业科学家和管理人员如何使用通过数字技术收集的新数据流。这位研究员将通过与渔民、渔业科学家和管理人员以及技术行业的利益攸关方进行半结构化访谈和参与观察来收集数据。这项研究将导致开发两个可行的工具：1)与渔民共同制定的数据共享议定书，非政府组织可以用来增加数据的可及性；2)针对注重公平的数据做法的建议，将传播给政策制定者、非政府组织和渔业科学家并向公众提供。这项研究的结果将为有关渔业数据治理的关键海洋政策辩论提供信息，并提供按性别获得渔业数据如何影响捕捞参与的经验证据。通过这项研究产生的新的渔业数据公平框架有可能改变对蓝色经济的研究，将重点从采掘技术转移到数据技术，作为促进更公平地参与渔业和海洋治理的途径。该奖项反映了国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This award is funded in whole or in part under the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (Public Law 117-2). This award was provided as part of NSF's Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences Postdoctoral Research Fellowships (SPRF) program. The goal of the SPRF program is to prepare promising, early career doctoral-level scientists for scientific careers in academia, industry or private sector, and government. SPRF awards involve two years of training under the sponsorship of established scientists and encourage Postdoctoral Fellows to perform independent research. NSF seeks to promote the participation of scientists from all segments of the scientific community, including those from underrepresented groups, in its research programs and activities; the postdoctoral period is considered to be an important level of professional development in attaining this goal. Each Postdoctoral Fellow must address important scientific questions that advance their respective disciplinary fields. Under the sponsorship of Dr. Jenny Goldstein at Cornell University, this postdoctoral fellowship award supports an early career scientist investigating the social benefits and barriers to integrating new data and technologies in fisheries science and management. Overfishing threatens global fisheries sustainability, yet policies to reduce the impact of fishing are said to be limited by critical data shortages. Digital technologies, such as cameras and geospatial tracking devices, have emerged as low-cost tools for collecting data on fishing activity. However, despite the widespread proliferation of data collection technologies, little research has examined the relational practices through which fisheries data are developed and deployed. This research examines data sharing practices between non-governmental organizations (NGOs), fishers, and other environmental governance actors to understand how digital fisheries data is collected, shared and applied in environmental decision-making. Whereas previous research has focused on planetary-scale environmental data networks, this study foregrounds the quotidian embodied practices of collecting and applying data and the complex interdependencies between the global and the local. This project advances knowledge in key ways by theorizing the linkages between data justice, gender and environmental equity in the Blue Economy, and by exploring gendered experiences with environmental data, particularly in the context of rural and resource-based livelihoods. The results can help inform policies and institutional practices that empower women while also improving fisheries sustainability with technology. This study employs a multi-sited case study of a new digital fisheries data collection program. This research asks three questions: 1) How do new data streams and data collection technologies enable or constrain fisheries participation, and in particular the participation of women? 2) In what ways do the design and development of data infrastructure and fisheries management strategies mutually inform one another? 3) How can data practices support equity in the Blue Economy? The research objectives are to: i) explore how fishers and women from fishing households perceive digital fisheries data, its role, importance and value, particularly in relation to their fishing livelihoods and; ii) evaluate how fisheries scientists and managers use new data streams collected with digital technologies. The Fellow will collect data through semi-structured interviews with fishers, fisheries scientists and managers, and stakeholders from the technology industry and through participant observation. The research will result in the development of two actionable tools: 1) a data-sharing protocol co-produced with fishers that NGOs can use to increase data accessibility and 2) recommendations for equity-oriented data practices which will be disseminated to policy-makers, NGOs and fisheries scientists and made publicly available. The results of this study will inform key ocean policy debates about fisheries data governance and provide empirical evidence for how gendered access to fisheries data impacts fishing participation. The novel fisheries data equity framework produced through this study has the potential to transform research on the Blue Economy by shifting focus from extractive technologies to data technologies as avenues for advancing more equitable participation in fisheries and oceans governance.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.