Knowledge co‐production: A pathway to effective fisheries management, conservation, and governance

Abstract

Although it is assumed that the outcomes from scientific research inform management and policy, the so‐called knowledge–action gap (i.e., the disconnect between scientific knowledge and its application) is a recognition that there are many reasons why new knowledge is not always embraced by knowledge users. The concept of knowledge co‐production has gained popularity within the environmental and conservation research communities as a mechanism of bridging the gap between knowledge and action, but has yet to be fully embraced in fisheries research. Here we describe what co‐production is, outline its benefits (relative to other approaches to research) and challenges, and provide practical guidance on how to embrace and enact knowledge co‐production within fisheries research. Because co‐production is an iterative and context‐dependent process, there is no single way to do it, but there are best practices that can facilitate the generation of actionable research through respectful and inclusive partnerships. We present several brief case studies where we describe examples of where co‐production has worked in practice and the benefits it has accrued. As more members of the fisheries science and management community effectively engage in co‐production, it will be important to reflect on the processes and share lessons with others. We submit that co‐production has manifold benefits for applied science and should lead to meaningful improvements in fisheries management, conservation, and governance.

Learning from knowledge co-production research and practice in the twenty-first century: global lessons and what they mean for collaborative research in Nunatsiavut

“…Second, knowledge co-production is an innovative, flexible, and reflexive concept, allowing coproducers to (re)discover, (re)evaluate, and (re)negotiate principles and approaches to match the context and intent of their initiatives and partnership coalitions (Mach et al 2020;van Kerkhoff and Lebel 2015). Third, the inclusion of diverse actors increases the potential to produce actionable science and knowledge that will translate to policies and decision-making (Armitage et al 2011;Beier et al 2017;Hill et al 2020a), generating more reliable, representative, and feasible routes to addressing complex challenges, from fisheries management to climate change (Aminpour et al 2021;Beier et al 2017;Bremer and Meisch 2017;Cooke et al 2020). Fourth, its inclusion of diverse knowledge systems allows for epistemologies, or ways of knowing, to be (re)asserted or challenged through attempts to grasp how others view the world, yielding the potential to shift power relations and overcome conflicts between different value positions and worldviews (van der Hel 2016).…”

“…Similarly, collaborative case studies that bridge diverse knowledge systems have surged in the twenty-first century, particularly knowledge co-production projects with and for Indigenous peoples (Alexander et al 2019;David-Chavez and Gavin 2018;Klenk et al 2017;Miller and Wyborn 2020). In response, scholars are building an indispensable catalog of interdisciplinary case studies, conceptual treatments, literature reviews, and coproduction frameworks to condense decades of findings (Albrechts 2012;Beier et al 2016;Bremer and Meisch 2017;Cooke et al 2020;Djenontin and Meadow 2018;Jagannathan et al 2020;Norström et al 2020;Voorberg et al 2014;Wyborn et al 2019). Reviews and syntheses provide collective guidance for drawing from and deploying knowledge co-production principles in theory and practice.…”

“…Several important reasons underlie the need to conduct a systematic review of knowledge co-production to glean insights for a specific context. First, familiarity with knowledge co-production literature is considered a critical precursor to effective co-production efforts, independent of context (Cooke et al 2020;Lemos et al 2018). Second, participation/collaboration does not guarantee co-production (e.g., Alvarado et al 2020) in that 'collaboration' can represents a spectrum of governance arrangements that varyingly affect power relations, co-productive capacities, and project intentions (Hill et al 2012;van Kerkhoff and Lebel 2015).…”

“Two‐Eyed Seeing”: An Indigenous framework to transform fisheries research and management

“…MEB approaches seek to connect distinct knowledge systems (Alexander et al, 2019), often through parallel lines of Indigenous and Western scientific inquiry (Tengö et al, 2014), but mechanisms and successful examples of this or equivalent approaches in practice, especially in an aquatic or fisheries context, have been few and far between (e.g. Cooke et al, 2020; Laidler, 2006; Mackinson, 2001).…”

Using Multiple Ecological Models to Inform Environmental Decision-Making

“…There are examples of the successful use of multiple modeling approaches to aid in resource management decisions (e.g., SEDAR, 2015SEDAR, , 2020Xiao and Friedrichs, 2014;Kaplan et al, 2019) and the current literature provides guidance on best practices of selecting, calibrating, and validating ecological models for natural resource decision-making (e.g., Schmolke et al, 2010;Link et al, 2012;Rose et al, 2015;Heymans et al, 2016;Fath et al, 2019). There has also been recent momentum on the use of action science to facilitate coproduction of fisheries management strategies (Cooke et al, 2020). Here, we present how using two food web models can provide a broad and robust view of system dynamics, making a considerable step toward co-production.…”