ABSTRACT
Many scientists and managers who work on fishery and coastal issues are deeply pessimistic. In many cases, both fish stocks and fishing communities are in poor health, and coastal ecosystems are in decline. Yet other scientists and managers are able to point to cases of healthy stocks, communities and ecosystems (Orensanz et al. 2005; Hilborn 2006; Cinner et al. 2013). In this volume, I make the argument that the decline of coastal resources and ecosystems is not inevitable. There is an accumulated body of theory and practice that should allow us to improve on the record of the last half-century or so. However, solutions are not clear-cut, and there are no global blueprints or widely applicable recipes to follow. More likely, solutions need to be worked out case by case, collaboratively and adaptively. This chapter starts by revisiting the historical approach taken in this volume, followed by a recap of the eight
subdisciplines to build an interdisciplinary science of resource management for coastal and marine environments. Finally, the chapter explores two divergent strategies that may be used to build such an interdisciplinary science.
