Fishing institutions: Addressing regulative, normative and cultural-cognitive elements to enhance fisheries management

Institutional approaches in natural resource management in general and in fisheries in particular seldom address cultural aspects or social institutions like kinship. In this study, a broad institutional approach is used to investigate the institutionalization of small-scale fisheries and seaweed farming in a seagrass dominated bay in Zanzibar. Regulative, normative and cultural-cognitive institutions and their rapid/slow moving properties are analyzed. The results show that dynamics of cooperation and conflict between different institutional elements and the balance of forces among actors are crucial to understand fisheries management dynamics. Regulations are, despite their importance, insufficient to promote sound management if they are not backed up by norms and cultural-cognitive institutions. Fisheries management would benefit by broadening the institutional perspective to increase the efficiency of management and to avoid blueprint solutions. The study shows that gaining knowledge about the wide institutional setting takes time but the investment is worth it in the long run.