Case Study of the ‘English Patient’



Fig. 6.1
Map of the UK MPA network. Implemented MCZs are dark blue, recommended MCZs light blue. The insert map top right shows the boundary of the four regional MCZ projects. (Courtesy of Aled Nicholas and Seafish 2014)



Before the proposed designation of MCZs, around 30 % of the territorial waters around England and Wales were already under some type of spatial management measures1, including fisheries closures administered through the CFP (Rogers 1997), protected areas administered through the EU Birds and Habitats Directives (Natura 2000 sites), and RAMSAR2 sites. The proposed MCZs would complement these protected areas to make an MPA network (Jones 2012), thereby meeting the UK’s obligations under the ‘Marine Strategy Framework Directive’ (MSFD) (2008), OSPAR (1992), the WSSD (2002), and the CBD (2010). However, although many ENGOs believed that MRs should take a more central role in UK marine management (Roberts and Hawkins 2000; Wright 2010), there was no explicit call for MRs in the MCAA. This is one reason why the MCCA was criticised by the environmental lobby for not providing adequate protection to UK habitats from damaging fishing activities and developers. The MCCA was also criticised by the fishing industry for having disproportionate negative socioeconomic impacts on fishermen (Jones 2007). Behind this conflict of interest lay a clash of perspectives between NPs and SCs, and it is the tension between these competing perspectives on the issue of the MCZ network in England that informs the present chapter. The chapter deconstructs the policy debates over MCZs and MRs, beginning with an analysis of the antecedent documents to the MCCA, and of reports, news articles, and key informant interviews, to build a picture of contentious issues during the period when the MCCA was being drafted, debated, and enacted by the British parliament.



6.2 Sources of Data


The MCAA was informed by several public consultation exercises and expert reports from the early 2000s. Documents from these exercises and reports were sourced from the Defra website3 and acted as ‘seeds’ for other relevant documents through an examination of their bibliographies. Other data such as press releases and ENGO reports were obtained through internet searches. Hansard (the verbatim report of proceedings of the UK Parliament’s House of Commons and House of Lords) was sourced from the Internet. Relevant sections of these various documents were coded according to theme, and this material was used alongside interview data to illustrate opposing viewpoints of NPs and SCs on each theme. Key-informant interviews were undertaken from June 2010–Sept 2012. Twenty-one people were interviewed, including Members of Parliament, civil servants, university scientists, ex-government scientists, ENGO activists, statutory conservation agency employees, fishing industry representatives, marine renewable energy spokespersons, and media workers. Interviewees were identified from their authorships of policy reports, key-note speeches at conferences, and occasionally through ‘snow-balling’ (an interviewee would recommend speaking to a particular person). Standard interview questions included: can MRs play a role in fisheries management in the UK? do MRs have clear conservation objectives? should we designate MRs when there is uncertainty in the underlying data? will MRs have any benefits for fishermen?

Analysis of this data enabled us to interpret policy arguments on English MCZs, showing how apparently technical issues may hide normative assumptions (Fischer 2003). Like Foucault (1980), Fischer (2003) described policy change as resulting from the competition between a challenging viewpoint and a hegemonic viewpoint which is embedded in existing institutions. This builds on the idea by Hajer (1995) who suggests that politics is an argumentative struggle in which actors not only try to make their opponents see the problem according to their viewpoint, but also seek to portray other actors in specific ways: for instance, ‘struggling, brave fishermen vs. unhelpful environmentalists’ (Lawton 2007, p. 470), or fish robbers versus a well-intentioned European Commission (NFFO 2011a). From an analysis of relevant policy documents and grey literature, key-informant interviews, and peer-reviewed science, an argumentative struggle between the two competing viewpoints of NP and SC emerged repeatedly. Both the NP and the SC discourses claim to have strong scientific foundations, but scientific claims that are based on robust empirical evidence can be differentiated from those that are less well grounded. We look at how different stakeholders viewed the term ‘science’; the extent to which the debate became ‘scientised’ with respect to the planning of MCZs; and how advocacy caused empirical claims and normative beliefs to overlap.


6.3 Results and Discussion4



6.3.1 Planning Work Preceding MCAA Drafting (1999–2006)


Campaigns for a Marine Bill by the UK green lobby began in the late 1990s, and in 2000, an advocacy coalition, the Wildlife and Countryside Link, composed of organisations including MCS, RSPB, the Wildlife Trusts, the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society (WDCS), and the WWF formed a Marine Task Force to coordinate the exercise. This network organised several public operations, including the Marine Reserves Now campaign run by the MCS and Co-op group (2007–2009), and Marinet’s campaign calling for MRs. There was also a UK-based Marine Reserves Coalition (a partnership of six organisations: Blue Marine Foundation, Client Earth, Greenpeace UK, MCS, Pew Environmental Group, and Zoological Society London) campaigning for the government to establish an ecologically coherent network of Highly Protected Marine Conservation Zones (HPMCZs) covering at least 30 % of UK seas out to 200 nautical miles. In 2009, this pro-MR lobby sought to persuade the public to urge their MPs to sign an Early Day Motion (EDM 3375) registering support for an amendment to the Marine Bill to include this requirement. In an email to a prospective supporter, a campaigner from Marinet wrote that ‘We’ll be in touch again with the details of what to ask your MP. As well as electronic campaign materials available on the website, we have generous amounts of printed resources that can be sent out to you’ (pers. comm. 11.2.09).

At the same time, there were growing calls for MRs made by international regimes such as OSPAR, CBD and WSSD epitomised by a WWF report that synthesised the current evidence (Roberts and Hawkins 2000). Responding to these pressures, during the late 1990s Defra began laying the foundations for the MCAA by commissioning a series of reports that set out the UK’s vision and strategy for improved marine environmental management. The first of these reports, Safeguarding our Seas, stated that the UK government was committed to an ecosystem-based approach (EBA) to marine management, a key element of which ‘is the conservation and where possible, enhancement of marine ecosystems in a way that conserves biological diversity and ensures the sustainable development of our marine resources’ (Defra 2002, p. 9, para. 1.32). This document stated six principles that would inform the government’s approach to EBA, three of which are directly relevant to the science–policy interface (see Table 6.1).




Table 6.1
Principles of UK marine strategy relevant to the science–policy interface
























Principle

Description

Conflicts

Robust science

Understanding the processes and influences that impact on the marine environment and using research to inform policymaking and marine management

Science is open to varying degrees of interpretation, particularly regarding the debates on the efficacy of MRs and sensitivity of different habitats to different fishing pressures

Precautionary principle

Sensibly erring on the side of caution where the scientific evidence is not conclusive

Members of the fishing industry argue that it is unrealistic and unfair to shift the burden of proof on to fishermen: how do you prove a gear has no impact?

Stakeholder involvement

Involving all stakeholders so that they are an integral part of the decision-making process

Does inclusive decision-making diminish the role of the expert? Who is a stakeholder?

Defra pledged its commitment at the 5th North Sea Conference held in Bergen in 2002 to identify and designate MPAs by 2010 according to a ‘clear understanding of natural processes and the ecological requirements of marine species, habitats and ecosystems’ (Defra 2002, p. 9, para. 1.33). In 2003, OSPAR adopted MPAs as an approach to protect marine biodiversity in the NE Atlantic: ‘the Commission will, inter alia, promote the establishment of a network of MPAs to ensure the sustainable use, protection, and conservation of marine biological diversity and ecosystems’ (OSPAR 2003a, p. 1, para. 2). Such a network would be ecologically coherent and would restore and prevent further degradation of species and habitats. The UK government’s commitment to OSPAR was the main driver behind the push by the devolved administrations to establish an MPA network (Defra civil servant), and it was the job of the Joint Nature Conservation Committee (JNCC) to advise government on the designation of the UK-wide network of MPAs6.

In late 1999, the UK Government and devolved administrations commissioned a working group of the statutory nature conservation agencies (SNCAs) and commercial and recreational interests to conduct a pilot study in the Irish Sea to develop a framework for planning that would reconcile nature conservation objectives with development objectives in the marine environment (Vincent et al. 2004). The subsequent report, Review of Marine Nature Conservation recommended the establishment of an ecologically coherent network of marine protected areas designed according to the following five principles (see Table 6.2): connectivity, representation, replication, sufficiency, and practicality, which were taken from experiences of designating MRs in New Zealand (Ballantine 1999). These principles formed the basis of England’s approach to setting up MCZs: in March 2010, Defra issued a list of seven principles which would underpin the design of the MPA network—representativity, replication, viability, adequacy, connectivity, protection, and use of best available evidence (see Jones 2012)—and became the foundation of the Ecological Network Guidance (ENG) which was to inform the deliberations of the four regional projects: Finding Sanctuary (South-West); Irish Sea Conservation Zones (Irish Sea); Net Gain (North Sea); and Balanced Seas (Eastern Channel).




Table 6.2
Principles of an ecologically coherent network of important areas. (Defra 2004, adapted from Ballantine 1999)

























Design principle

Description

Connectivity

Networks should be designed to ensure that areas are mutually supporting (i.e. populations of animals and plants in one area should be capable of supporting, and be supported by populations in other areas). The need to protect vulnerable life stages of highly mobile species, including their movement between breeding and feeding grounds, should be taken fully into account

Representation

Networks should seek to incorporate the full spectrum of biological diversity, not just that subset which relates to rarity, endangerment, or other pre-selected importance values

Replication

Examples of habitats (or concentrations of species) should be replicated in separate areas to insure against loss due to catastrophic events whether from natural or human-induced causes

Sufficiency

The total area of the network, and its distribution in terms of individual component areas, should be capable of meeting the objective of sustaining species and their habitats in perpetuity

Practicality

The best available information should be used in site selection, but the development of the network should not be delayed pending action to collect further information, though practical considerations, including those which support sustainable development, should also be taken into account in site selection

However, in the ENG, there were no recommendations for NTMPAs, as the government wanted to retain flexibility to decide the appropriate kind of protection on a case-by-case basis. In a letter to the Friends of the Earth Marine Network (Marinet), the Minister (Huw Irranca-Davies) stated that ‘we are committed to ensuring that the Bill provides the right level of protection for MCZs, according to the conservation objectives of each zone and the science underpinning it. I have no doubt that there will be MCZs with high levels of protection’ (Irranca-Davies 2009). The only mention of MRs in the Review was a call for the establishment of large-scale trial MRs to test their fisheries benefits, to which the government responded by requiring at least one ‘reference area’ (i.e. a no-entry zone) to be established in each regional project area as a bench mark against which to judge the effectiveness of partially protected MCZs. The 127 proposed MCZs contained 65 such reference areas within them, 2 % of their total areas—well short of the 30 % demanded by RCEP (Jones 2012).

MRs were much more emphatically on the agenda of the ENGOs and the statutory conservation agency, English Nature (now Natural England (NE)) (Rees et al. 2013). Many ENGOs had fought for the inclusion of NTMPAs in 30 % of English waters (Jones 2012), and English Nature argued that only MRs could deliver the EBA (Laffoley et al. 2004). Complementing this positive narrative about the benefits of MRs, a new negative narrative emerged in the UK in 2004. There was a growing appetite in the national UK media for stories that reflected disparagingly on activities of the fishing industry7 (Symes 2005). In the words of a journalist respondent:



the media, especially the national…media and the TV, are very much on the environmental bandwagon. They’ll always tend to be interested in stories that show fishermen in a bad light…guys like Charles Clover, at The Telegraph, and from The Times, Frank Pope, they’re very much wedded to the environment and very anti-fishermen. I think that is a significant change that’s happened over the last 10 or 20 years, the public’s view of fishermen. At one time they were pretty well respected: they were guys who went to sea and did a tough job and put food on the table; horny-handed heroes, salty sons of toil. But I’ m afraid now, many people just think of them as brigands and vandals, destroyers of the earth, sadly. And I think the media’s had quite a large part to play in promoting that image of fishermen.

This negative view of the fishing industry was also reflected in two influential reports published in 2004 which examined the impact of fisheries on UK marine ecosystems. First, the Net Benefits (2004) report from the Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit (PMSU) stated that ‘commercial fishing has had the largest single negative impact on the marine environment’s sustainability’ (PMSU 2004, p. 10, para. 5). It listed 33 recommendations that would facilitate the reform of the UK fishing industry, one of which was for a trial run of MPAs. It is unclear in this report precisely what a MPA meant, though the context seems to suggest an area where there is at least a ban on towed bottom gear. Acknowledging the uncertainties of using MPAs in UK waters, the report asserted that ‘as with other aspects of fisheries management, a lack of perfect knowledge should not lead to inaction and maintenance of the status quo, but to an adaptive and precautionary approach’ (PMSU 2004, p. 93, para. 6).

Second, the scientifically authoritative RCEP report (2004, p. 205, para. 8.96), Turning the Tide, called for 30 % of UK waters to be set aside as MRs in order to combat overfishing, and claimed that the recommendations of the Net Benefits report were ‘too tentative and too slow’. However, the RCEP report was criticised for overlooking the differences between reef-based areas and soft bottom areas (Defra 2010); for making scientific claims that were not supported by peer-reviewed sources; for referencing unpublished work which could not be found (Roberts and Mason 2008); and for lack of transparency in its calculations of the costs of implementing and managing the marine reserve network (Symes 2005). Nevertheless, the RCEP report provided prestigious support for a narrative in which fish stocks were crashing and MRs were needed to deliver stock recovery and ensure that fish populations were sustainable in the long term (Lawton 2007). This narrative was adopted by members of the green lobby in their attempts to persuade the UK government to establish networks of MRs, and it formed a significant part of the NP viewpoint.

Responding to Turning the Tide, the UK government stated that it was ‘developing plans for a controlled trial of MPAs which aim to have both fisheries and wider marine conservation benefits’ (Defra 2006c, p. 9, para. 8.96). However, this controlled trial was never carried out—a failure blamed on the uncooperative attitude of the fishing industry, according to an NP scientist respondent: ‘So what would the effect be of putting large no-take zones?…We made the recommendation that to resolve this issue once and for all the fishing industry should engage with the conservation sector to do some large-scale no-take trials to see what the benefits were—they haven’t done it’. There were, however, financial reasons why these trials for MRs did not go ahead (MacGarvin and Jones 2000); if such a large-scale trial were to be undertaken there would have to be some reassurance from government that fishers’ loss of profit would be fully compensated, but the issue of compensation raised several objections. First, UK marine fisheries are common property, so those exercising their right to use the resource are not eligible for compensation from the public purse. Second, fishers could switch to alternative grounds to maintain their income. Third, it is very difficult to distinguish between fishermen who have a legitimate right to compensation and those who lie about their fishing in a certain area in order to receive compensation (Jones 2009). Fourth, fisheries management in the UK is under the exclusive legislative jurisdiction of the European Commission through the CFP8, so if MRs were to be implemented in the UK EEZ, compensation for the negative impact on other countries’ fishing fleets’ loss of income would also be due (Symes 2005). Fifth, the fishing industry had already benefitted from subsidies: ‘From a societal perspective, the tax payer has already paid for subsidies to keep the towed sector of the fishing fleet in profit. Overexploitation by the fishing industry has left us in the position we are currently facing, therefore they should not be compensated’ (ENGO policy officer).

The case for MRs also ran into opposition over the proposed percentages of sea area for MRs. Gell and Roberts (2003) suggested from their review of modelling studies that between 20 and 50 % of the ocean should be designated as MRs. The case in favour of a large percentage was rehearsed by a NP marine scientist respondent:



if you look at it from a range of scientific angles, whether it is on the grounds of increasing the spawning stock biomass of target fish species, maximising long term yields, minimising loss of genetic heterogeneity, ensuring that you have all species protected somewhere and replicates of them in different protected areas…the answers that you get on how much you need are in the tens of percent not just percent…20, 30, 40; it’s not 2, 3 or 4.

However, this claim does not take into account such factors as the patchy distribution of fishing effort (Jennings and Lee 2012); the complexity of the fishing industry (Phillipson 2002); and habitat heterogeneity (Greenstreet et al. 2009). The trawling footprint has been estimated at between 5.4 and 21.4 % for English and Welsh waters (Eastwood et al. 2007; Stelzenmuller et al. 2008; Jennings and Lee 2012). Although this is likely to be an underestimate for two reasons: first, the estimate excluded static and pelagic gears; and second, only vessel monitoring system (VMS) data (not required for vessels < 15 m) was used, thus ignoring the distribution of effort by smaller trawlers (Jones 2008), it means that large portions of seabed were not trawled regularly, if at all, and that de facto MRs already existed in English waters. Advocacy for MRs to reduce fishing pressure also ignored the fact that since 1996, the UK fishing fleet had contracted by 26 %, and fishing power had fallen by 23 %, with a parallel reduction in pressure on the marine environment (Elliott et al. 2012).

Defra’s response to the RCEP recommendation for designating 30 % of the UK’s EEZ as MRs (Defra 2006c) was cautious, stating that it was uncertain of the scientific basis for that figure. Perhaps Defra’s caution was based on the findings of three studies it had commissioned to review the lessons learned from MRs in Northern European waters, and to calculate the potential contribution that MPAs could make to the recovery of specific fish stocks (CEFAS 2005; Pascoe and Mardle 2005; Sweeting and Polunin 2005), since the general theme that emerged from these reports was that candidate reference areas should be assessed for their merits on a case-by-case basis.

Clearly, a challenging voice had emerged to contest the dominant9 NP discourse in the pre-drafting stage of the MCAA: the fishing industry and other resource users set out to influence government by forming an anti-MPA advocacy coalition (AC)10. Initially, the fishing industry collectively was slow to recognise the potential impacts of MCZs on their interests, perhaps because of limited communication between Defra and the fishing industry as the Marine Bill was being planned. Later, however, the fishing industry made up for lost ground by challenging the scientific and democratic basis of the MCZ network designation process through the MPA Fishing Coalition (MPAC). The MPAC was officially launched at the House of Commons in February 2010, ‘to provide the fishing industry with a powerful negotiating platform’ (Fishing News 26.2.10: 1). However, it was conceived not only as a pressure group but also as a forensic body with scientific expertise to expose scientific error in the MCZ designation process: ‘the only way fishermen are going to avoid being swept off fishing grounds is by presenting a strong, coherent case backed by factual evidence…It is clear that just lodging a protest—even a very loud protest—is simply not going to be enough. The MPA Fishing Coalition will…not deal in loud diplomacy. It will be serious and evidence-based’ (Fishing News 26.2.10: 1). Importantly, the MPAC did not oppose MPAs per se (Fishing News 10.12.10: 24)—they ‘are a reality’ (Fishing News 2.4.10: 24)—but insisted that ‘MPAs must be introduced in a fair, considered and proportionate way’ (Fishing News 4.12.09: 6). Austin Mitchell (MP for the fishing port of Grimsby) said that ‘The fishing industry supports Marine Conservation Zones (MCZs) but not if they’re to be used as environmental overkill’ (Fishing News 6.11.09: 6). Lockwood (MPAC chairman) stated that ‘We are not here to thwart MPAs, but to ensure they are science-led by genuine evidence, and that whatever restrictions are introduced are rational and proportionate’ (Fishing News 25.11.11: 8). He said that ‘The industry is not against MPAs in principle but it is totally opposed to designation by diktat…I have found that too many people engaged in MPA promotion and site selection have virtually no knowledge or understanding of fish, fishing or the fishing industry…the MPA process invariably starts with a blank sheet of paper rather than building on what is already in place…Skippers have knowledge and data that must form a vital part of the MPA designation process’ (Fishnewseu.com 15.6.10). The MPAC did not intend to precipitate an ‘adversarial trial of strength’ but to adopt ‘a consensus-based approach with negotiated and agreed outcomes’ (NFFO 2012a).

The pro-MPA AC role adopted by some scientists was criticised by the MPAC because it sought to increase fish stocks through reducing fishing mortality by siting MCZs in areas where fishing mortality was the highest, but the fishing industry pointed out that aside from the negative socioeconomic impact of designating an MCZ in an area that is intensively fished (the NFFO declared that ‘We are determined that this will not be some kind of marine highland clearance, with fishermen callously evicted from their traditional fishing grounds’ (Fishing News 26.2.10: 2)), the displacement of fishing activity to areas outside the MCZ could lead to the loss of biodiversity in habitats that were previously un-fished (NFFO 2010). The anti-MPA AC also criticised the pro-MPA AC for its shift in advocacy on the issue of trawling and dredging. Initially, the majority of NP scientists wanted a blanket ban on trawling and dredging in all MCZs because in their view, if this did not happen, MCZs would merely be ‘paper parks’ (Monbiot 2012). However, scientific studies showing the impact of bottom trawling on the seabed produced mixed results—some suggesting that trawling had a negative impact on habitat structure (Watling and Norse 1998; Hall-Spencer and Moore 2000) and benthic invertebrate productivity (Hiddink et al. 2006), but others suggesting that any impact was negligible (Hiddink et al. 2007), or even positive (Beare et al. 2014). On the realisation that in many cases no-trawl MCZs could not be justified on the evidence, NP scientists reframed the debate calling for no-take reference areas to be established to allow the recovery of the seabed for research purposes.11 But the fishing industry adamantly rejected this argument:



There is absolutely no need for draconian areas of ‘no-man’s land’ for the purpose of measuring ecological improvement in marine protected areas which would be readily evident from any general time-series programme of monitoring. Such proposals…show a careless disregard for people’s livelihoods in order simply to give a free reign to conservation scientists’ experiments…[Is this] really what society wants from marine protected areas; scientific playgrounds and barren fishing communities that were once vibrant? (Rodmell 2011)

The MPAC was strongly opposed to reference areas: ‘They are not based on credible science directly applicable to the UK…Whether they are effective or not should be tested against evidence from temperate zone North Atlantic, not tropical reefs, but there is no sign of this. There is also no requirement for reference areas within the Marine Act’ (Fishing News 25.11.11: 8). MPAC said that ‘The fishing industry can be persuaded to accept restrictions on its activities where a specific scientific case has been presented, argued and found substantive. What it cannot accept is the imposition of restrictions on a whim—as appears to be the case with MCZ ‘reference areas’’ (MPAC n.d.). Rodmell described reference areas as ‘‘a no man’s land’ banning the vast majority of activities for the sake of establishing a set of scientific research dominions’ (Fishing News 13.1.12: 17). JNCC and NE rejected this attack on reference areas: ‘Reference areas are not scientific playgrounds. They will help ensure that decisions about the way MCZs are managed are based on the best available evidence’ (Fishing News 18.3.11: 24).

Another criticism of the pro-MPA AC was for its overly conservative attitude to risk. For example, several MCZs were proposed by scientists on the basis of limited evidence of the presence of a habitat/species vulnerable to fishing12. The scientists justified their stance on grounds that imperfect knowledge was reason enough to invoke the precautionary principle so that restrictions were placed on potentially damaging fishing methods (e.g. dredging/trawling). However, the fishing industry claimed that the absence of robust evidence in support of placing a restriction on fishing was reason enough to allow current fishing to continue (see Chap. 6). On this issue, neither side could legitimately claim the backing of science, because the dispute was over competing (subjective) attitudes to risk, not competing claims of (objective) scientific evidence.

Figure 6.2 gives a graphic indication of how the two ACs influenced outcomes on MCZs by the relative size of the dashed boxes and positions. Currently, there is a stronger pro-NP than pro-SC narrative running through the national media, though there is still uncertainty over the respective influence of the pro-MPA and anti-MPA ACs on government, since what types of fishing activity will be excluded from MCZs have not yet been decided. It is predicted that the final management measures are likely to reflect a compromise between the two factions.



A322899_1_En_6_Fig2_HTML.gif


Fig. 6.2
The advocacy coalitions that have shaped outcomes on the design and management of MCZs. The green box indicates international ENGOs that have influenced thinking on MPAs both internationally and nationally. Blue boxes indicate the pro-MPA advocacy coalition; red boxes indicate the anti-MPA advocacy coalition

Scientists could be found offering their expertise to both the pro-MPA and the anti-MPA ACs, thereby bolstering the credibility of the cause of each coalition and influencing public opinion (Grorud-Colvert et al. 2010). Both ACs played up certain kinds of evidence to support their respective causes: the pro-MPA scientists emphasised the fisheries benefits of marine reserves; while the anti-MPA lobby emphasised the displacement effects of marine reserves (Turnhout et al. 2007; Weible 2007).

So two discourses have emerged from this discussion: (1) the dominant NP discourse, whose main adherents were environmentalists and marine ecologist scientists, which called for the systematic protection of representative habitats at a national level and emphasised the use of ecological criteria to lead site designation; and (2) the challenging SC discourse, whose main adherents were marine users (principally the fishing industry) and fisheries scientists, which was not necessarily anti-MR, but keen to prevent inappropriate siting of MRs by emphasising that socioeconomic and other evidence (for example, habitat, species distributions, and climate change effects) must be taken into account during site designation, and that such planning was best done at the local level (see Table 6.3).




Table 6.3
Contrasting characteristics of the NP and SC perspectives on MCZs in English waters

































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Nature protectionists

Social conservationists

Objectives of MCZs

To systematically protect representative habitats and species through networks

To protect habitats and species vulnerable to fishing

Main criteria for MCZ designation

Representative habitats

Vulnerable habitats/species

Approach

Systematic conservation planning

Local spatial planning

Governance process to set MCZ objectives

Top-down decision making with some input from stakeholders

Bottom-up decision making through deliberative discussion between stakeholders

Attitudes towards science-policy

Natural science criteria to lead process; socioeconomic evidence to choose between similar sites

Natural science and socioeconomic evidence treated equally. Political compromise necessary

Attitude towards science and the precautionary approach