Social simulation of fisheries and coastal management - Call for papers and participation.
A 2-day workshop on social simulation of fisheries and coastal management held in Manchester, UK.
http://ssfcm.wordpress.com
Organised by:
The Centre for Policy Modelling, the Stockholm Environment Institute (Oxford Centre) and the University of Tromsø – The Arctic University of Norway.
Key dates:
Abstracts submission: 15th April.
Draft programme ready: 5th May
Workshop: 6-7th June
Location:
Manchester Metropolitan University Business School,
All Saints Campus, Oxford Road, Manchester, UK.
Keynote lectures:
• Anthony Charles*, Saint Mary’s University, Nova Scotia, Canada
• Volker Grimm, Department of Ecological Modelling, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research, Germany
• Nanda Wijermans, Stockholm Resilience Centre, Sweden
Rationale:
People worldwide depend on fisheries and coastal ecosystems for their income and subsistence production needs. How these systems are managed and developed is therefore a critical question with sustainability, equity, poverty and health dimensions. Studies of the risks associated with the management of these systems are traditionally led by top-down approaches dominated by scientific and technical experts. However, in many cases opportunities are opening up for including plurality of perspectives in management and for decentralisation of decision-making. Increasingly, there are bottom-up study tools available to support this.
Agent-based models are well suited for applying systems approaches to the study of fisheries and coastal ecosystems and the options for management. Evidence, if it is needed, can be gained from a look at recent publications, work of scientific associations like ESSA and funding of collaborative projects (eg. SAF21) and increasing support from interdisciplinary programmes. Potential applications range across different aspects of fisheries and coastal management including for example: social and legal norms in coastal communities, applications of Ostrom’s suggestions for managing social commons, understanding trade-offs in coastal systems, coupling of social simulations and complex ecological models, simulations and games as public educational tools, participatory simulations of fisheries and coastal ecosystems, and other relevant development orientated research.
Workshop objectives:
- Further establish the academic-developer-practitioner network and build on shared interests
- Support and develop solutions together and improve the use of data and methods
- Work towards the integration of tools and methods and creation of decision support frameworks
Workshop outline:
A. The format of the workshop is informal – allowing time allocated to discussion of use of social simulations in this emerging area. Participants are invited to give a presentation or to introduce a discussion topic – please send an abstract to [email protected] by the 15th April.
B. The workshop will end with a special practical session on testing social simulation models, where participants are invited to interact with them (to evaluate the user-perspective, to discuss technical aspects of model design, coding and software aspects, model data and transparency, decision-making etc.). If you would like your model/platform to be considered, please contact [email protected] .
Agenda:
Day 1. 10-11am Reception and Introductions
Day 1. 11am-1pm Keynote Lectures
Day 1 2-5pm Workshop Session I
Day 1 6.30-8.30pm Film premiere*
Day 2. 9-11am Workshop Session II
Day 2 11.30-12.30am Discussion
Day 2 1.30-4pm Interactive Hands-on Session with Models
All participants, please register your participation at ssfcm.wordpress.com by the 15th of May.
*The workshop will run alongside a meeting of the project SAF21 – Social science aspects of fisheries for the 21st Century and this includes the UK premiere of the movie A turning tide in the life of man by Loïc Jourdain, which workshop participants may attend. The director of the movie will be present at the screening and the movie will be followed by a short discussion session.