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Since 1990, papers presented at successive women/gender and fisheries conferences of the Asian Fisheries Society have followed a pathway trodden by other fields of gender research. Starting with noticing androcentrism in fisheries, the conferences proceeded to noticing the omissions and adding depth of detail on women’s roles and their contributions. Adding gender perspectives then helped to identify politicized policy and power structures and recognize the importance of accounting for intersectionality, as well as propose transformation. Historically, this work is rooted in the broader scholarship on gender and fisheries, in which the positions of women are dictated by the prevailing political economy of fisheries, itself embedded in the global political economy. Despite the greater insights, the position of women has changed little. The time is therefore ripe for gender and fisheries researchers to broaden their horizons and develop a feminist fisheries political economy agenda to better support activism for gender equal fisheries. A foundation for such work has already been laid in fisheries from the gender studies and activism of fisheries restructuring under globalization. The global feminist political economy project also has paved the way. The global project can be adapted to guide three major fisheries research areas. The first is understanding the gendered structures in fisheries economies as embedded in the gendered global economy. The second key is specifically assessing fisheries economic policies and practices using the lens of women’s rights in the fish value chain, from production inputs to rights of access to fish and fishing, and to women’s position in post-harvest processing and marketing. The third is examining the unpaid and household economy in which a great deal of women’s fisheries and reproductive work in the household and community is done. As the new research agenda and its link to activism may not be embraced by some mainstream agencies already studying gender and fisheries, do we need to create feminist fisheries political economy think tanks with greater flexibility?

The article Gender norms and relations: implications for agency in coastal livelihoods

Bài viết này khám phá tiềm năng của Biển Wadden trong việc tưởng tượng về kỷ nguyên Nhân sinh. Khái niệm Nhân sinh đại diện cho một thử thách đối với trí tưởng tượng văn hóa, vì nó gắn kết thời gian địa chất sâu xa, các sự kiện gần đây và hiện tại, cũng như tương lai lâu dài; những hệ quả địa lý và thế hệ của công lý; và sự ràng buộc sâu sắc giữa tiến bộ nhân loại và sự suy thoái sinh thái. Chúng tôi lập luận rằng bối cảnh văn hóa của Biển Wadden là một không gian mà trong đó các nghịch lý và kết nối này được thể hiện và cụ thể hóa. Các tác phẩm văn học và nghệ thuật liên quan đến Biển Wadden thể hiện một nhận thức phê phán về sự ràng buộc của kỷ nguyên Nhân sinh: trong phân tích của chúng tôi, chúng tôi khám phá các hình ảnh và biểu đạt văn bản về Biển Wadden và chỉ ra cách mà nó phục vụ như một địa điểm cho sự tưởng tượng về quá khứ và tương lai của hành tinh chúng ta.

There is a controversy in the literature on marine protected areas (MPAs) over the way their outcomes are portrayed in terms of winners and losers. On the one hand, many analysts have portrayed MPAs as win-win solutions, resulting in both increased biodiversity and improved livelihoods. On the other hand, some analysts have argued that win-win outcomes are mythical, and in practice, MPAs invariably result in trade-offs between ecological and economic objectives. This study seeks to test which of these two hypotheses fits the Cabo de Palos Islas Hormigas marine protected area (CPH-MPA) in southeast Spain. However, it does so not by analysing directly the tension between the two objectives of ecological and economic goals, but by analysing the tensions between four groups of stakeholders—fishers, divers, community residents, and administrators—which map on to the tension between the two goals. The study is based on 111 interviews of key informants conducted in 2013–2014 to discover the perceptions of stakeholders on the issue of who are the winners and who are the losers as a result of the MPA. The main findings of this study on the CPH-MPA are that winning and losing are very complex and ambiguous categories; that there is no objective way of determining who are winners or losers; that the situation of winners and losers is due to human intervention rather than a natural and inevitable process; that win-win outcomes are implausible because trade-offs between wins and losses are inevitable; and that political authorities have to decide who will be the winners and who will be the losers.

Land-based fish-processing activities in coastal fringe areas and their social-ecological impacts have often been overlooked by marine scientists and antislavery groups. Using remote sensing methods, the location and impacts of fish-processing activities were assessed within a case study of Bangladesh’s Sundarbans mangrove forests. Ten fish-processing camps were identified, with some occurring in locations where human activity is banned. Environmental degradation included the removal of mangroves, erosion, and the destruction of protected areas. Previous studies have identified cases of labour exploitation and modern slavery occurring within the Sundarbans, and remote sensing was used to triangulate these claims by providing spatial and temporal analysis to increase the understanding of the operational trends at these locations. These findings were linked to the cyclical relationship between modern slavery and environmental degradation, whereby environmental damage is both a driver and result of workers subjected to modern slavery. Remote sensing can be used as an additional methodological tool to support the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and provide evidence to support the promotion of the “freedom dividend” which would have far-reaching economic, social, cultural, and environmental benefits. Satellite remote sensing is likely to play an important role going forward for understanding these issues but should be augmented with ground-based data collection methods.

This paper examines what may happen when the internationally renowned Malawi principles for ecosystem-based fisheries management are implemented in real-life situations. To explore this, an ecosystem-based fisheries management plan for the southern part of the Lake Malawi is used as a case study. However, the lessons learned are relevant for the global implementation of these principles. Drawing on ‘interactive governance theory’, we argue that implementation involves all three ‘governance-orders’, (1) where the governance principles are formulated, (2) where the institutions are designed to operationalise and implement these principles, and (3) where implementation and enforcement actually take place and become routine operation. The Malawi principles must be institutionalised and, subsequently, find their concretisation in the way the southern Lake Malawi ecosystem is actually managed by, and according to, the Malawi Principles and the institutions of which management is a function. Our case study portrays the need to build capacity to address the implementation challenges as they appear at all three governance-orders. We suggest that ecosystem-based governance is a more appropriate term, for what the Malawi principles aim to achieve, than management, which we associate with the more technical elements of this approach.

Subsistence (or food) fisheries are under-studied, and the interaction between subsistence and commercial fisheries have not been studied systematically. Addressing this gap is the main contribution of the present paper, which focuses on how to deal with the challenge of overlapping commercial and subsistence fisheries. The study was conducted in Norway House Cree Nation, with qualitative data collection and questionnaire surveys. Commercial fishing in Norway House takes place during spring/summer and fall seasons, whereas subsistence fishing takes place throughout the year. Commercial fishing mostly occurs in the open waters of Lake Winnipeg; subsistence fishing in rivers adjacent to the reserve and in smaller lakes inland. How do fishers and the community deal with overlaps and potential conflicts between the two kinds of fisheries? The main mechanism is the separation of the two temporally and spatially. In the remaining overlap areas, conflict resolution relies on monitoring of net ownership and informal communication. The first mechanism is regulatory but really de facto co-management in the way it is implemented. The second is consistent with Cree cultural values of respect, reciprocity and tolerance.

Whaling is a globally controversial topic, and Faroese drive-style whaling, grindadráp, is no exception. A complex common-pool resource (CPR) institution, viewable from multiple moral, social, economic and political viewpoints, grindadráp is a challenge to assess. Responding to calls to utilise more relationship-centred and multi-perspectival approaches to studying CPRs, this article examines grindadráp utilising the theory of socio-cultural viability, which asserts diverse understandings of the world can be classified within a fourfold typology and that ‘successful’ institutions draw on all four social solidarities in dealing with challenges that arise. The analysis reveals how throughout grindadráp’s history its place in Faroese society has been maintained through the enforcement of a largely egalitarian conceptualisation. However, in meeting various challenges around the distribution of meat, sustainability and killing methods, the institution has accepted solutions utilising alternative conceptualisations. It is this adaptability which has allowed grindadráp to remain a popular part of Faroese society, even as dependence on pilot whale meat has declined. The issue of toxins in pilot whale meat is found to be arguably the greatest threat to grindadráp, undermining the egalitarian foundations of the practice, the response to which is something that Faroese society is currently in the process of negotiation.