Management Participants Perceive That Structural Barriers, Not Information Needs, Most Impede Adaptation in U.S. Fisheries Management

ABSTRACT

Fisheries are facing increasingly frequent and severe climate change‐related stressors such as marine heatwaves, harmful algal blooms, and species distribution shifts. Many fisheries management bodies have been working to increase the capacity of their regulatory systems to adapt to these new conditions, but progress has been slow and piecemeal. To identify the most important barriers to this adaptation, in spring 2024 we surveyed 321 fisheries management professionals and fisheries scientists involved in the U.S. regional fisheries management system. This survey revealed broad agreement among respondents about the most and least important barriers to adaptation, regardless of respondents' regional affiliation or role in the management system. In particular, two key barriers emerged as being salient to almost all survey respondents. These barriers were stakeholders focusing on protecting their current interests and/or the status quo (82% agreement) and a tension between the structural rigidity of the U.S. fisheries management system and the flexibility needed to adapt (71.5%). In contrast, conceptual and informational barriers, such as not seeing a need to adapt (4% agreement) and not recognizing the usefulness of adaptive capacity concepts (14% agreement), were the least salient across regions and roles in management. These results suggest that successful climate adaptation will depend on tackling difficult structural challenges, such as developing more flexible regulatory systems and creating mechanisms to address concerns and resistance by stakeholders who expect to incur losses in the process of adaptation.