ABSTRACT
To understand Consideration should be centred on
How ocean policy has evolved The interaction between science, social organisation, and the law of the sea
The role played by international policy
The UN Conferences on Environment and Development, and the UN Conferences on the Law of the Sea
How the environmental approach has evolved
The UN Conference on the Human Environment, and the UN Conference on Environment and Development
How the legal approach has been implemented
The 1958 and 1973-82 UN Conferences on the Law of the Sea
What ocean management patterns may be identified
National maritime jurisdictional zones in the context of international waters
How coastal management may be conducted
The individual maritime jurisdictional zones and the components of the coastal ecosystems
How deep-ocean management may be conducted
The high seas and deep sea-beds
Which ocean boundaries are relevant to ocean governance
The boundaries of the neritic zone, the outer edges of the continental shelf and rise, and the outer limits of the maritime jurisdictional zones
The spheres of influence of ocean governance
Coastal areas, deep-ocean and regional seas
4.1 A leading chain of impacts During the 1970s and the rise of post-modern society, the ocean began to be perceived as a component of the planetary system with an increasingly influential role to play in world organisation. As a result, a new political and social awareness began to develop, sustained by a broad range of contributory factors. Research, based on satellite monitoring, revealed the scale and complexity of the interaction between the atmosphere and the ocean. At the same time the environmental degradation of the oceans, which was the focus of the 1972 UN Conference on the Human Environment (Boczek 1986), began to be perceived by society as a global issue with profound implications for all human communities and for future generations. The increasing demand for food, energy and raw materials (Cruickshank 1998) led to the belief that the ocean’s living and non-living resources were an indispensable factor in mankind’s survival. Finally, it became evident that population growth within coastal and island areas was in danger of becoming an irreversible process to the extent that the Athens Center of Ekistics, which specialised in research on settlements, predicted the rise of the marine ecumenopolis (Stewart 1970) – a continuous urbanised fringe covering the coasts of all the continents.
