Integrated marine science and management: Wading through the morass

Introduction countries worldwide are now considering developing (or at least being required to consider developing) a holistic marine management planning framework which can encompass all the marine users and uses, the players and stakeholders, and the demands on the system (e.g. Borja et al., 2010). Given that there are many sectors involved in the marine environment (shipping, fishing, aquaculture, industries, recreation, etc.), there is the need for integrated management but within that multi-manager sectoral framework. Each sector usually has its own administrative body (e.g. Boyes and Elliott, 2014a) and often the complexity of the system means that one sectoral body, for example for conservation, is so preoccupied tackling its own conservation aspects that they pay less attention to others, such as fisheries. aim of that management framework should be to build on the previous history of marine management, for example in Europe and North America since the 1970s, and should not alienate legitimate sectoral planning bodies but rather build on existing expertise and linkages. Furthermore, for it to be successful requires an inclusive system involving stakeholder expertise and understanding. The pages of this journal have long recorded the different aspects of marine management although usually these are treated separately – hence the aim of this note is to attempt to integrate the aspects.