Global Assessment of Perceptions of Procedural Equity in Marine Protected Areas

Abstract

Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) can benefit local communities but they can also have negative social impacts especially when communities are not equitably included in decision making processes i.e. procedural equity. As equity is becoming more prominent with targets like “30 by 30” calling for “equitable governance” of MPAs, it is important to think about what equity means in practice and to identify what MPA managers are doing to govern equitably. We analyzed global survey results from the Management Effectiveness Tracking Tool and the World Bank Scorecard to assess MPA managers/stakeholders perceptions of local community involvement in MPA management decisions. We created a global map of procedural equity for 367 MPAs and found some countries had groups of MPAs that had high or low equity while other countries had no distinct equity patterns. Our findings also showed that governance type had no significant effect on procedural equity, however, there were many more state governed MPAs (170) than any other governance type (<50). Respondents cited advisory bodies and consultative meetings as the most common activities associated with inclusive decision making. Pre-existing social context was the category with the most barriers to inclusive decision making. Insufficient communication was a common barrier to inclusive decision making but open, transparent communication was also cited as an enabler which shows that communication could be a good starting point to improve inclusive decision making. The most cited strategy to address the barriers or enhance the enablers to inclusive decision making was improving the relationship between communities and management. This research will help elucidate areas that potentially need equity interventions and what is currently being done/could be done to include local people in decision making.