Adventures in cross-disciplinary studies: Grand strategy and fisheries management
Introduction
The demanding nature of the ecosystem approach to fisheries management calls for cross-disciplinary learning and research and a willingness to think outside the standard box. Some researchers propose that the concept of “Grand Strategy” (GS), with roots in the fields of military studies and history, is the approach needed to deal with complex management issues. Does this approach have something to offer fisheries management?
Yale University's Brady–Johnson Program in Grand Strategy is dedicated to applying the ideas of GS to “a broad spectrum of human activities” and in organizations ranging from corporations to international institutions to NGOs [99]. There are also grand strategy programs at Duke, Carnegie Mellon and Temple Universities, among others. Business has long since adopted the terminology and thinking related to strategy and grand strategy [33]. The Yale team who inaugurated the program, most prominently Gaddis and Kennedy, have themselves applied the principles of GS to the field of public health.
This article argues that GS does offer some insights to the field of fisheries management but its recommendations largely support those that have already emerged in that and related fields (such as the ecosystem approach to management (EAM) more generally, integrated coastal zone management (ICZM) and vulnerability and adaptation to climate change) in recent years. On the other hand, these fields have insights to offer to the aficionados of Grand Strategy.
This article presents the five core principles identified by the Yale team and applied to the issue of global health: (1) start with the ends in mind; (2) take an ecological approach; (3) recognize that tactics matter; (4) use positive deviance to characterize practical solutions and foster scale-up and (5) understand the importance of integrating timely intelligence [18]. It then adds a sixth principle that GS proponents should take on board: Always anticipate friction. For each principle in turn, the article discusses its meaning, how it mirrors current thinking in fisheries management and related fields and what insights it offers. It occasionally ranges beyond the Yale group's work to draw upon insights from other studies both of strategy and grand strategy. It concludes by arguing that what lies behind many of these lessons is the point that “politics matters” and by also offering a few cautions regarding the application of “Grand Strategy” in fisheries and environmental management.
Section snippets
What is grand strategy?
“Grand Strategy” has enjoyed a renaissance of late [4].
Gaddis and their colleagues [18] offer a typical definition: “the development and implementation of a comprehensive plan of action to achieve large ends with limited means.” Strategy is “grand” when it is comprehensive rather than sectorial in scope. As Liddell Hart characterizes it, “the role of grand strategy … is to co-ordinate and direct all the resources of a nation towards the attainment of the political object of the war – the goal
Why grand strategy? 1
What is it about grand strategy that might make it interesting for other fields? Making war is a highly complex endeavor that provides endless examples of the challenges that inherent in organizing a great many people to achieve a very big goal: all hands-on, down-in-the-dirt experience. As Liddell Hart [53] puts it, “history is practical experience”. The study of grand strategy arises out of military history, which is a series of case studies from which its students have sought to develop an
Discussion: the primacy of politics
Much of what the grand strategists have to teach are lessons already learnt in fisheries management, at least theoretically. From this perspective, the GS approach serves fisheries managers by neatly summing up, codifying and supporting many good points in a pithy manner. The GS approach, however, also serves to highlight two lessons that need particular emphasis: the importance of clear goals and a level of analysis perspective. It also highlights the importance of politics. But while the GS
Conclusion: the illusion of grand strategy?
Like all analogies, comparing fisheries management to war has its limitations. But looking at the experiences of waging war as encapsulated in the study of strategy can still draw attention to valuable lessons about attempting “big ends.” In many ways, the lessons to be learnt from the texts on (grand) strategy harmonize with lessons we have learnt in other fields of endeavor.
Perhaps the most important lesson GS can offer is the need for a grand vision that is formulated in something more than
References (101)
- et al.
Identification, definition and quantification of goods and services provided by marine biodiversity: implications for the ecosystem approach
Mar. Pollut. Bull.
(2007) The Canadia Atlantic groundfish experience and the constraints to the conservation of fisheries resources: a perspective
Oceans Coast. Manag.
(1998)- et al.
A review of fisheries management past and present and some future perspectives for the third millennium
Ocean Coast. Manag.
(2001) - et al.
Achieving large ends with limited means: grand strategy in global health
Int. Health
(2010) - et al.
Understanding marine ecosystem based management: a literature review
Mar. Policy
(2010) - et al.
Weak and strong sustainability in fisheries
Ecol. Econ.
(2010) - et al.
Ecosystem-based management in the Wadded Sea: principles for the governance of knowledge
J. Sea Res.
(2013) - et al.
A complicated relationship: Stakeholder participation and the ecosystem-based approach to fisheries management
Mar. Policy
(2008) - et al.
Responding to complex societal challenges: a decade of Earth System Science Partnership (RSSP) interdisciplinary research
Curr. Opin. Environ. Sustain.
(2012) The community: a missing link of fisheries management
Mar. Policy
(2000)
User participation in fisheries management: lessons drawn from international experiences
Mar. Policy
Objectives of fisheries management: case studies from the US, France, Spain and Denmark
Mar. Policy
The hesitant emergence of maximum sustainable yield (MSY) in fisheries
Mar. Policy
From user-groups to stakeholders? The public interest in fisheries management
Mar. Policy
Leaning on user-groups: the role of civil society in fisheries governance
Mar. Policy
Is there coherence in the European Union's strategy to guarantee the supply of fish products from abroad?
Mar. Policy
Observations on the implementation of ecosystem-based management: experiences on Canada's east and west coasts
Fish. Res.
Fisheries mismanagement
Mar. Pollut. Bull.
Challenges in cross-sectoral marine protection in Europe
Mar. Policy
Extended fisheries jurisdiction: origins of the current crisis in Atlantic Canada's fisheries
Mar. Policy
Flagships, umbrellas, and keystones: Is single-species management passé in the landscape era?
Biol. Conserv.
Sustainability: euphemism or hard choices?
Mar. Policy
Introduction: interaction between environment and fisheries: the role of stakeholder participation
Mar. Policy
Local ecological knowledge and practical fisheries management in the tropics: a policy brief
Mar. Policy
Institutional uncertainties in international fisheries management
Fish. Res.
Essence of Decision
The history of fisheries management and scientific advice – the ICNAF/NAFO history from the end of World War II to the present
J. Northwest Fish. Sci.
Plenty more fish in the sea? A working paper on the legal issues related to fishing beyond maximum sustainable yield: A UK case study
The Art of Grand Strategy
Def. Stud.
Current problems in the management of marine fisheries
Science
Is strategy an illusion?
Int. Secur.
Individual Transferable Quotas in Fishery Management
This is more difficult than we thought! the responsibility of scientists, managers and stakeholders to mitigate the unsustainability of marine fishers
Philos. Trans.: Biol. Sci.
International institutions and socialization in europe: introduction and framework
Int. Organ.
Hundred-year decline of North Atlantic predatory fishes
Fish Fish.
On War
Reconciling sustainability, economic efficiency and equity in fisheries: the one that got away?
Fish Fish.
Can catch shares prevent fisheries collapse?
Science
Resolving mismatches in U.S. governance
Science
The Provident Sea
From design to application of a decision-support system for integrated river-basin management
Water Resour. Manag.
Frenzy, and Plenty of Blood, in a One-day Halibut Season
Karl Von Der Heyden Distinguished Lecture: What is Grand Strategy?” Presented at the American Grand Strategy after War
Environment, economy and society: fitting them together into sustainable development
Sustain. Dev.
Cited by (2)
Dynamic patterns of overexploitation in fisheries
2017, Ecological ModellingCitation Excerpt :Many of the world’s fisheries are showing a decline in the fishing yield, a phenomenon that’s clearly important for the global economy and which is often interpreted in terms of the overexploitation of the fish stock (Pauly, 2009): the fishing industry is consistently depleting the fish stock at a rate higher than the capability of the system to replenish it, as a result of biological reproduction (Lotze and Worm, 2009), (Bailey, 2016).
Fisheries management approaches as platforms for climate change adaptation: Comparing theory and practice in Australian fisheries
2016, Marine PolicyCitation Excerpt :In this study, management approaches determine the key normative, theoretical and operational elements and the broad relationships between those elements that inform the specific management arrangements for common-pool marine resources within a broad governance system. Management approaches are high-level conceptualisations of normative, generalised governance arrangements (Fig. 1) [47,66,67]. They can inform all levels of fisheries management, in the case of ecosystem-based management, or inform specific management components such as harvest control rules or decision-making processes, in the case of co-management or adaptive management [68,69].