Science into policy? Discourse, coastal management and knowledge
Section snippets
Introduction: Science, policy and the coastal zone
The world's coastal resources are under pressure, even more so under climate change. Ecologically, this zone is also the most productive, and the mainstay of economic livelihoods on a global scale. Managing the coast effectively is crucial, from both social and ecological perspectives, but remains contested. The coastal zone is typically characterised by multiple jurisdictions, multiple habitats and scales, and many competing interests. In this paper we define the coast as “the area, on both
Method
Using the coastal zone as our focus, we apply historical document and discourse analysis to examine the role knowledge plays in affecting the science-policy interface in the management of the coastal zone. We acknowledge that the contribution of policy into science is also important, but not the scope of this paper. Using an historical approach, we reviewed the coastal literature using the key words ‘coastal management’, ‘knowledge’, ‘history of science’, ‘local’, ‘lay’ ‘Indigenous knowledge’,
Discourse 1: Knowledge when constructed as science
The tradition of knowledge being associated with science is a long one and “science is recognised as a particularly formidable enterprise” (Michaels, 2009, p. 995). Science is not only seen as synonymous with western knowledge, but has historically been constructed as being the type of information that is verifiable, and ‘true’. Indeed the term “Scientia” translates in Latin as ‘knowledge’ with the Latin phrase “scientia potestas est” commonly interpreted as meaning knowledge is power. Plato
Building bridges—Knowledge into policy in the coastal zone
Scientists and policy makers must work together in order to build effective coastal zone management regimes, but how can a future knowledge/policy interface continuum be built, one that is not contingent primarily on the advancement of science, but all kinds of knowledge into management? One that surmounts the constraints contained within the discursive framework that dominates decision making? This is not an easy challenge to resolve. Firstly, scientists and managers do not always find they
Conclusions
In this paper, we provide results of an historical and discourse synthesis that aimed to discover what the driving factors were influencing the incorporation of science into policy in the coastal zone. In so doing we found that the discursive construction of knowledge was a key factor driving change, and one that shaped and inhibited decision making. Specifically, we found two discourses about the coast dominate discussions about management yet this binary representation in practice hinders
Acknowledgements
This paper is based on research funded by the CSIRO Coastal Collaboration Cluster. We also acknowledge the many people who looked over this paper and the independent anonymous referees of this paper.
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