121
7 Ecosystem Health in the Context of Fisheries and Aquaculture…
The level of scale is perhaps the most problematic, especially when actions to
alleviate some of the problems imply changes that many countries are not ready
to bear. The struggle with the Kyoto protocol is a good illustration of the global
governability challenges.
Governability Analyses
Pressure on coastal ecosystems has grown in developed and less developed
countries. While it is frequently assumed that the developed world is better
equipped with the technology and resources needed to care for the environment
and minimize ecological degradation, such assumptions may be questioned.
Even with the best available science, a complete understanding of these processes is still lacking. Disasters such as the collapse of the Northern cod stocks
in Canada, despite large sums of funding and effort invested on research and
fi sheries management, can be attributed to insuf fi cient knowledge of the fi sh
species and their life history (Finlayson 1994 ; Hannesson 1996 ; Finlayson and
McCay 1998 ) . Restoring ecosystems may constitute a huge challenge in many
cases, as the decades of attempts in oyster restoration in the Chesapeake Bay
illustrate. In the Newfoundland cod fi sheries, the ecosystem changes occurring
after the collapse have driven some scientists to conclude that recovery would
be impossible, and that current fi shing practices may also hinder the possibility
of this recovery (Davies and Rangeley 2010 ) . It is very dif fi cult and extremely
costly, if not altogether impossible, to go back to the previous stages of ecosystems that have been hugely transformed by human activities. Precautionary
approaches have been proposed since the 1990s as a general principle in order
to avoid risks and irreversible processes (FAO 1996 ) . Yet, practical applications
of this principle are still rare (Punt 2006 ) . The challenges are greater for developing and less developed countries coping with these environmental issues
because of the scarcity of human and fi nancial resources. Often, short-term
goals to secure subsistence and livelihoods of coastal communities overcome longterm considerations for the ecosystem effects of human activities.
Ecosystem health can be considered an outcome of the governing interactions
between governing actors and institutions and the social system-to-be-governed in
the process of dealing with multiple stressors. It can also be treated as the existing
ecosystem conditions, posing conditions and limitation for governability that the
governance system needs to deal with. In the latter case, governability is related
mainly to the ability of the social system-to-be-governed and the governing system
to adapt to the present ecosystem state. The analysis of multiple stressors, particularly fi sheries, aquaculture or coastal development, in terms of how they affect
the system’s governability has already been demonstrated by Chuenpagdee et al.
( 2008 ), and is therefore only presented in summary below. The discussion
instead focuses on how to improve governability when faced with ecosystem
health under stress.
7 Ecosystem Health in the Context of Fisheries and Aquaculture…
The level of scale is perhaps the most problematic, especially when actions to
alleviate some of the problems imply changes that many countries are not ready
to bear. The struggle with the Kyoto protocol is a good illustration of the global
governability challenges.
Governability Analyses
Pressure on coastal ecosystems has grown in developed and less developed
countries. While it is frequently assumed that the developed world is better
equipped with the technology and resources needed to care for the environment
and minimize ecological degradation, such assumptions may be questioned.
Even with the best available science, a complete understanding of these processes is still lacking. Disasters such as the collapse of the Northern cod stocks
in Canada, despite large sums of funding and effort invested on research and
fi sheries management, can be attributed to insuf fi cient knowledge of the fi sh
species and their life history (Finlayson 1994 ; Hannesson 1996 ; Finlayson and
McCay 1998 ) . Restoring ecosystems may constitute a huge challenge in many
cases, as the decades of attempts in oyster restoration in the Chesapeake Bay
illustrate. In the Newfoundland cod fi sheries, the ecosystem changes occurring
after the collapse have driven some scientists to conclude that recovery would
be impossible, and that current fi shing practices may also hinder the possibility
of this recovery (Davies and Rangeley 2010 ) . It is very dif fi cult and extremely
costly, if not altogether impossible, to go back to the previous stages of ecosystems that have been hugely transformed by human activities. Precautionary
approaches have been proposed since the 1990s as a general principle in order
to avoid risks and irreversible processes (FAO 1996 ) . Yet, practical applications
of this principle are still rare (Punt 2006 ) . The challenges are greater for developing and less developed countries coping with these environmental issues
because of the scarcity of human and fi nancial resources. Often, short-term
goals to secure subsistence and livelihoods of coastal communities overcome longterm considerations for the ecosystem effects of human activities.
Ecosystem health can be considered an outcome of the governing interactions
between governing actors and institutions and the social system-to-be-governed in
the process of dealing with multiple stressors. It can also be treated as the existing
ecosystem conditions, posing conditions and limitation for governability that the
governance system needs to deal with. In the latter case, governability is related
mainly to the ability of the social system-to-be-governed and the governing system
to adapt to the present ecosystem state. The analysis of multiple stressors, particularly fi sheries, aquaculture or coastal development, in terms of how they affect
the system’s governability has already been demonstrated by Chuenpagdee et al.
( 2008 ), and is therefore only presented in summary below. The discussion
instead focuses on how to improve governability when faced with ecosystem
health under stress.