The Environmental Information: Use and Influence (EIUI) research team is pleased to announce the contributions by Bertrum MacDonald, Suzuette Soomai, and Peter Wells to the new book, The Future of Ocean Governance and Capacity Development: Essays in Honor of Elisabeth Mann Borgese (1918-2002). Prepared under the editorship of the International Ocean Institute-Canada (IOI-Canada) and published by Brill | Nijhoff, this volume contains over 80 insightful essays on the future of ocean governance and capacity development. Themes that constitute IOI-Canada’s annual summer training program on Ocean Governance (ocean science, environmental policy, marine law, and international management) served as a guide to the content of the book.
Peter Wells, one of the editors of the book, authored the “Introduction” to Part 4 on Ocean Sciences and an essay on “Health of the Oceans.” The latter highlights the history of state of the ocean reports and their role in building awareness of issues facing the ocean. He stressed the need for more rapid political, managerial, industrial, and scientific responses to crises in the ocean, especially with regard to climate change and major impacts on ocean resources and ecosystems.
Suzuette Soomai and Bertrum MacDonald are the authors of “Information Matters: Global Perspectives about Communication at the Science-Policy Interface.” This essay draws attention to the benefits of understanding characteristics of the science-policy interface related to how marine scientific information is produced, communicated, and used. Identification of the challenges and enablers in information pathways will enable efficient flow of information at the interface, thereby facilitating policy- and decision-making aimed at seeking and implementing solutions to serious coastal and ocean problems.
The essays written by the EIUI team members provided an opportunity to connect with a broad audience about the communication and use of information at the science-policy interface related to ocean and coastal management. The EIUI team has frequently participated in the IOI-Canada annual summer training program, “Ocean Governance: Policy, Law and Management.” The EIUI contributions to this new book will be of particular interest to the training program participants, students, practitioners involved in the broad spectrum of ocean governance issues, and the public.
Elizabeth Mann Borgese (1918-2002) was well-known globally for her efforts in the 1970s and 80s to establish the UN Law of the Sea Convention and to create the International Ocean Institute (based in Malta) and IOI-Canada at Dalhousie University. Publication of The Future of Ocean Governance and Capacity Development was timed to coincide with the 100th anniversary of her birth. The book was launched on 1 November 2018 at Dalhousie University.
– – – –
International Ocean Institute-Canada. (2018). The future of ocean governance and capacity development: Essays in honor of Elisabeth Mann Borgese (1918-2002). Brill | Nijhoff. xxvii, 564 p. ISBN 9789004380271 (Print and E-Book).
