Does co-management facilitate adaptive capacity in times of environmental change? Insights from fisheries in Australia

Abstract

This article assesses how federal and state government approaches to fisheries co-management in Australia facilitate adaptive capacity to environmental change. Drawing on the Adaptive Capacity Wheel, co-management approaches were assessed in terms of their capacity to: (1) encourage the involvement of a variety of actors, perspectives, and solutions; (2) enable actors to continuously learn and improve governance institutions; (3) allow and motivate stakeholders to self-organise, design and reform their institutions; (4) mobilise leadership qualities of social actors; (5) mobilise resources for decision-making and implementation; and (6) support principles of fair governance. Results show that federal government approaches have been limited in facilitating adaptive capacity. Conversely, co-management approaches in South Australia have gone part way to facilitate such capacity. Ultimately, this study underscores how broad characteristics of fisheries management arrangements facilitate adaptive capacity to improve success of fisheries co-management in responding to environmental change.