Oyster origin stories: How ‘native’ and ‘alien’ categories shape restoration in northwestern Europe

Abstract

Restoration is gaining prominence as an approach to protect and rehabilitate marine ecologies in the Global North. It represents a shift from hands-off conservation to a more hands-on intervention to bring back species and habitats that are assumed to be degraded or lost. Understanding restoration as a practice of care illuminates the politics involved in how categorizations shape decisions about which forms of nature deserve rehabilitation. Drawing on fieldwork conducted in 2022, the authors explore these politics through examining oyster restoration in southeast England and the Netherlands. They show how efforts to restore the ‘native’ European flat oyster (Ostrea edulis) in the North Sea starkly contrast with the categorization of Pacific oysters (Crassostrea gigas) as unwanted ‘aliens’. Drawing from science and technology studies, they argue that such native/alien categorizations are not merely representational but performative, actively shaping the realities they purport to describe. They trace how the native-alien distinction developed historically and became tied to oyster restoration work across Europe's North Sea. Their analysis uncovers the values buried within decisions regarding which creatures belong in marine restoration and which do not. It shows how these categories determine which relationships between humans and marine creatures get included in restoration work.