Introduction: An empirical framework for deconstructing the realities of governing marine protected areas

Debates surrounding governance strategies for marine protected areas (MPAs) have to date largely focused on top-down, bottom-up or market-based approaches. Whilst co-management approaches for governing MPAs are widely accepted as a way forward for combining these three strategies, many interpretations of this concept exist and it is applied in many different ways in MPAs in different contexts. This study aimed to explore governance through a case-study approach based on a specifically developed empirical framework – the marine protected area governance (MPAG) analysis framework – to increase understanding of how to combine the three governance approaches. A dialogue with MPA practitioners in 20 case studies helped shape the MPAG analysis framework as it developed, and an international workshop was held on ‘Governing MPAs’, bringing the practitioners together to compare results and further develop the framework. This paper provides an overview of the topic and research methodology and briefly introduces the case studies further explored in this special issue.

Research Highlights
► Marine Protected Areas represent an interesting context for analysing governance Approaches.
► Co-management is a context rather than a solution to governance challenges.
► Empirical framework is outlined for governance analyses based on combining incentives.
► The research focus is the realities of combining top-down and bottom-up approaches.
► Twenty case studies to which the empirical framework was applied are introduced.