European seas are encountering an upsurge in competing marine activities and infrastructures. Traditional exploitation such as fisheries, tourism, transportation, and oil production are accompanied by new sustainable economic activities such as offshore windfarms, aquaculture, and tidal and wave energy. One proposed solution to overcome possible competing claims at sea lies in combining these economic activities as part of Multi-Use Platforms at Sea (MUPS). MUPS can be understood as areas at sea, designated for a combination of activities, either completely integrated in a platform or in shared marine space. MUPS can potentially benefit from each other in terms of infrastructure, maintenance, etc. Developing MUPS in the marine environment demands adequate governance. In this article, we investigate four European sites to find out how governance arrangements may facilitate or complicate MUPs. In particular, we apply a framework specifying

No abstract

Throughout the world, there is a growing interest in communities' selfgovernance of natural resources. However, many self-governance initiatives proceed with difficulty, particularly when these initiatives conflict with established rules and institutions. This paper addresses the question of the extent to which, and under what conditions, self-governance initiatives can become successful in heavily regulated policy fields. It, therefore, analyses a self-governance initiative by a Dutch farmers' association from two theoretical perspectives: Ostrom's institutional design principles and insights from the politics of self-governance. Whereas, Ostrom's principles focus on arranging interactions between the members of a self-governing community and their common resources, the focus of the politics literature is on the negotiations between the community and the governmental authorities to obtain room for self-governance. The paper reveals how the arrangements within the association influenced the negotiation between this community and the involved authorities, and vice versa. This mutual relationship can both positively and negatively influence the accomplishment of self-governance. Adequate self-governance arrangements can help to convince policy-makers to provide room in existing policies to accommodate self-governance. Conversely, policy-makers can help to set conditions for designing successful arrangements. Otherwise, both processes can negatively reinforce each other, and this can result in stalemates and blockades.

Dit rapport doet verslag van het onderzoek 'Ruimtelijk-economische condities landbouw in relatie tot natuur & biodiversiteit', dat is uitgevoerd om meer inzicht te verschaffen in de ruimtelijke diversiteit in de ontwikkeling van de Nederlandse landbouw en wat deze impliceert voor kansen voor het versterken en verbinden van natuur en landbouw. Het betreft een eerste kwantitatieve verkenning van de ruimtelijkeconomische verschillen in de landbouw in Nederland en is de opmaat voor een kwalitatief vervolgonderzoek.Het rapport richt zich specifiek op wat er op de agrarische grond in Nederland gebeurt. Er wordt gekeken naar de ontwikkeling van de totale hoeveelheid cultuurgrond, de gewasarealen en dieraantallen en de veranderingen hierbinnen, met aandacht voor ruimtelijke verschillen. Er wordt tevens ingegaan op de agrarische bedrijfsontwikkeling en de ruimtelijke verschillen daarbij. Daarvoor zijn indicatoren als de agrarische grondprijs en de standaardverdiencapaciteit gebruikt, om meer inzicht te verkrijgen in relatie tot het typeveranderingen in het agrarisch grondgebruik. Bovendien wordt ingegaan op de ontwikkeling van de verbrede landbouw.

Conditions for natureinclusive practices. Analysis of four types of nature-inclusive businesses. Statutory Research Tasks Unit for Nature & the Environment, WOt Technical Report 121. 94 pp; 12 fig.; 70 ref.; 2 Appendices.This report examines which conditions determine whether or not businesses and individuals will make their activities more nature-inclusive and what options there are to improve the opportunities for scaling them up. The study was limited to nature-inclusive social initiatives, in particular those taken by businesses and entrepreneurs, focusing on initiatives in four economic domains: nature-inclusive farming, urban agriculture, the construction industry and the holiday accommodation sector. The initiatives examined are not cases studies as such, but more in the way of interesting practices from which conclusions can be drawn. To supplement this, some overarching conclusions and recommendations have also been formulated. The analytical framework used in the study was a combination of the transition and policy arrangement approaches. The research was an explorative study based on a document analysis, interviews and group discussions with stakeholders who have a good grasp of the trend in nature-inclusive practices in their sectors, rather than detailed knowledge of specific initiatives. The main conclusions of the overarching analysis are: 1) that the scaling up of natureinclusiveness in economic sectors would benefit if businesses and government embraced a strategic vision, and 2) that a networking and responsive government can promote cooperation between businesses and social actors.