Mobilizing Knowledge for Coastal Governance: Re-Framing the Science–Policy Interface for Integrated Coastal Management: Fid-Bau Portal

Mobilizing Knowledge for Coastal Governance: Re-Framing the Science–Policy Interface for Integrated Coastal Management

Bremer, Scott / Glavovic, Bruce

Integrated coastal management (ICM) has long sought to create political settings within which coastal communities can arrive at collective decisions, and support these decisions with the best quality knowledge available. Traditionally this has been through the integration of natural and social science with the political processes of decision-making and management, across the so-called science–policy interface. Contemporary developments in the field have seen the rising prominence of governance models, with a number of scholars arguing this to have implications for the shape of the science–policy interface. This article reviews the evolution in the theory and practice of the science–policy interface for ICM, before arguing that in the future the interface should be framed as a “governance setting.” To this extent, the article distills four important guiding principles, including an interface that: (i) espouses an epistemology based in the dialogic mobilization of knowledge; (ii) includes all diverse knowledge perspectives; (iii) integrates disparate knowledge systems through dialogic reciprocity and co-existence; and (iv) has explicit regard for the negotiated quality of knowledge relative to a specific issue.