ABSTRACT
In the first case the focus is on the epistemology of empiricism – that is the goals of what is at stake – at the baseline or definitional stage of Action Evaluation. What do the various key stakeholders in an AE – individually, in terms of their identity groups and across them – define as success? The environmental case studied in this chapter is about the future of New England Fisheries Management. It specifically examines the several-year Action Evaluation project called The Fleet Visioning Project (FVP) and describes the process by which individuals and groups arrive at consensus around concrete what-goals and begin gaining a sense of agency and cooperation regarding shared problems and their remedies. The central question asked here is: What is the new reality regarding the fishing stock, its protection and access to it, that stakeholders are trying to imagine, together?
