Legal Bedrock for Rebuilding America's Ocean Ecosystems

Author(s): Mary Turnipseed, Larry B. Crowder, Raphael D. Sagarin and Stephen E. Roady

Published: April 2009

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Recent discussions about ocean policy reform have focused on ecosystembased management, which fully incorporates humans and considers the cumulative impacts of their activities on ecosystems and the services they provide (1). This approach is logical given the highly interconnected social-ecological systems of the ocean (2) and may be best realized through comprehensive marine spatial planning and ocean zoning (3). But U.S. ocean governance as currently configured cannot easily accommodate ecosystem-based management (4).