Understanding translation: Co-production of knowledge in marine spatial planning

Abstract

Marine spatial planning (MSP) has been defined as a collaborative process concerning the use of marine resources and space. It entails the translation and synthesis of the involved sectoral interests into a common language to enable the co-production of knowledge amongst the stakeholders. Ideally, MSP allows a common understanding of the socio-ecological system in question, which in turn is intended to generate consensus regarding the respective regulations to foster sustainability of the marine environment. In practice, however, MSP confronts key challenges concerning transparency, accountability, knowledge integration and stakeholder's empowerment. We present here a framework based on Actor-Network Theory (ANT) for addressing these challenges. Specifically, the framework applies Callon's moments of translation and Latour's due process to achieve an enhanced and robust translation, communication, and mediation of knowledge amongst stakeholders. Through a case study, the MSP of the North Pacific Marine Region in Mexico, we demonstrate how ANT helps realize the full potential of MSP as a transdisciplinary, collaborative governance tool. Operationally, decision support tools integrated to geographical information systems are employed to enable partakers to actively participate in the co-production of usable knowledge by following Callon's principles of agnosticism, generalized symmetry and free association, as well as Latour's phases of perplexity, consultation, hierarchy, and institution. The output provides a basis for consensus building regarding the desirable marine zoning scheme and set of regulations that may support a better management of environmental conflicts in a context of socio-ecological changing conditions.