ABSTRACT
This chapter examines governance challenges associated with coral reefs, in the process highlighting the importance of interactions among the ecological and social aspects of marine governance. Coral reefs around the world’s oceans are degrading quickly as a consequence of global climate change and local factors, such as water pollution and overexploitation. Innovative marine governance is required to reverse the degradation, where possible, and to minimise the decline where it is not. That governance is so far lacking. Using Australia’s Great Barrier Reef as a case study, the chapter explores ‘ecological reflexivity’, an idea that has the potential to bolster coral reef management and increase its chances of success. Combining ecological reflexivity with aspects of institutional analysis, the chapter proposes a conceptual framework that illuminates the circumstances and conditions under which innovative governance for coral reefs affected by global change might be realised.
