Marine Protected Areas, Multiple-Agency Management, and Monumental Surprise in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands

John N Kittinger,Per Olsson,Anne Dowling,Andrew R Purves,Nicole A Milne

doi:10.1155/2011/241374

Abstract

Large, regional-scale marine protected areas (MPAs) and MPA networks face different challenges in governance systems than locally managed or community-based MPAs. An emerging theme in large-scale MPA management is the prevalence of governance structures that rely on institutional collaboration, presenting new challenges as agencies with differing mandates and cultures work together to implement ecosystem-based management. We analyzed qualitative interview data to investigate multi-level social interactions and institutional responses to the surprise establishment of the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument (monument) in the northwestern Hawaiian Islands (NWHI). The governance arrangement for the monument represents a new model in US MPA management, requiring two federal agencies and the State of Hawai‘i to collaboratively manage the NWHI. We elucidate the principal barriers to institutional cotrusteeship, characterize institutional transformations that have occurred among the partner agencies in the transition to collaborative management, and evaluate the governance arrangement for the monument as a model for MPAs. The lessons learned from the NWHI governance arrangement are critical as large-scale MPAs requiring multiple-agency management become a prevalent feature on the global seascape.

Highlights

Coral reef ecosystems comprise less than 0.1% of ocean space [1], but they are disproportionately important with regards to the critical role they play in tropical cultures worldwide [2]
In the northwestern Hawaiian Islands (NWHI), polycentric governance systems were first established through the creation of novel, multi-agency management structures and an agreement among agencies to work toward consensus in decision-making processes [53]
Ocean governance is moving towards increased collaboration, and multipleagency co-trusteeship is an emergent feature of larger marine protected areas (MPAs) and seascapes in the Pacific and beyond

Summary

Introduction

Coral reef ecosystems comprise less than 0.1% of ocean space [1], but they are disproportionately important with regards to the critical role they play in tropical cultures worldwide [2]. The social benefits that coral reefs provide are threatened, by a relatively small set of proximate, or direct, human activities that include overexploitation, landbased pollution, biological invasions, disease, and threats associated with climate change [7,8,9]. The principal response to reef ecosystem decline and degradation has been an increased focus on the implementation of marine protected areas (MPAs), which reserve ocean space for conservation. MPAs exhibit a variety of forms but generally share a common goal to preserve resources and the ecosystems in which they are embedded

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