This blog is written by Dr Christina Kelly, Dr Ben McAteer, Dr Lindsey West, Professor Geraint Ellis and Professor Wesley Flannery, School of Natural and Built Environment, Queen’s University Belfast.

Planning at Sea

In 2016, Flannery and Ellis edited an Interface collection that made a powerful call to action to the marine planning community. They urged scholars and practitioners to look beyond technical procedures and to interrogate the politics of marine spatial planning (MSP), asking questions such as:

• who has most influence in decisions on the exploitation and management of marine resources?
• who benefits most from these arrangements?

At the time, MSP research was dominated by positivist, managerial framings and descriptive case studies that largely sidestepped these uncomfortable questions. Ten years on, following the growth of MSP scholarship and practice, it is now worth asking - how effectively have we answered their call?

A global governance problem

We now find ourselves facing the daunting intertwined challenges of the climate, biodiversity and pollution crises.  Their consequences are already visible: rising temperatures, increased extreme weather events, ocean acidification, and widespread ecological degradation. Despite decades of compelling climate science and climate pledges, global responses are left wanting, with mitigation and adaptation efforts insufficient for the scale of the challenge. This is not a pattern unique to the UK or Europe: it is a global governance problem centred on how we manage our common ecological resources.

Blue growth agenda

In this context, planning - terrestrial and marine - has a central role in shaping climate outcomes. MSP, in particular, is positioned to advance climate mitigation through the coordinated development of offshore renewables, sustainable transport, food provision, blue carbon protection, and nature-based adaptation. However, marine resources remain vulnerable to exploitation and power imbalances persist. Offshore renewable energy sectors are displacing biodiversity and fisheries. The “blue growth” agenda, marketed as a pathway to sustainable prosperity, increasingly resembles ocean grabbing, deepening inequalities that foster “blue injustice”. Despite a fivefold increase in MSP scholarship since 2016, a gulf still remains between scholarship and practice. The critical questions raised a decade ago are now more urgent than ever.

Advancing knowledge and understanding of radical MSP

Since 2016, researchers in the School of Nature and Built Environment at Queen’s University Belfast (QUB) have progressed the call for more progressive forms of MSP by fostering a substantial body of critical marine social science research. This has led to a new focus on ‘climate smart MSP’ as a crucial tool for addressing social justice concerns arising from the changing distribution and scale of marine development. The influence of political, institutional, and power dynamics on marine planning outcomes is now better understood while distributional, procedural, and recognitional justice are more central to debates surrounding the future role of MSP.

Fragmented governance constrains MSP’s ability to deliver the transformative governance that is urgently needed in the face of increased exploitation of marine resources (see PERMAGOV). Critical perspectives have revealed complex interactions between the blue growth agenda and the social, cultural, and heritage values associated with marine and coastal spaces. For instance, development at sea poses risks to cultural and place-based identities, while providing  opportunities for communities to benefit from more sensitive forms of exploitation (see PERICLES and CoCoMar). Building on this research, a science-based Decision Support System has been developed to align MSP with biodiversity goals (see MarinePlan). Working with cross-sectoral stakeholders, tools have been developed to integrate ecological priorities into marine plans. Collectively, this MSP research offers important insights into leverage points and transition pathways (e.g. MOSES) that can be exploited by practitioners to support more just and equitable futures for coastal communities.

Call for action  

MSP is a key part of the governance framework for addressing looming socio-ecological crises. To fulfil its potential, we need to transform how MSP is designed and implemented. Meaningful stakeholder participation needs to be at the centre of MSP so that local and experiential knowledge is embedded from the outset and reflected in its outcomes. Ongoing marine social science research is essential to understand how shifting policy priorities affect coastal communities and power dynamics at sea. Stronger links between MSP practitioners and marine social science research groups, including the MarSocSci network, are critical to ensuring that MSP is informed by evidence, lived experience, and inclusive knowledge systems. Likewise, MSP will need to align with strategic frameworks such as the European Ocean Pact and wider marine governance agendas.  

Lessons from terrestrial planning highlight the importance of democratic, participatory processes in driving meaningful social change. MSP must evolve into a more progressive and communicative practice that balances competing interests in a more transparent, just way. It needs to be a long-term collective process of managing marine environments in the public interest for the benefit of future generations.

Header image of wind turbines (Source: Theunen-Institut/Kay Panten)