Marine spatial planning as an instrument of sustainable ocean governance

Marine Spatial Planning (MSP) is a relatively new instrument designed to alleviate conflicts between human uses as well as between human uses and the marine environment. According to a popular description, MSP is ‘a process of analysing and allocating parts of three-dimensional marine spaces (or ecosystems) to specific uses or objectives, to achieve ecological, economic, and social objectives that are usually specified through a political process’ (UNESCO, 2013). It ‘allows both a high level of environmental protection and a wide range of human activities’ (Day, 2008, p. 823). MSP can play a proactive role in planning, setting out a future framework and targets for spatial use. Forward-looking planning can therefore supplement or even replace the ad hoc systems of decision-making and regulation (Crowder and Norse, 2008, pp. 772-78); Ehler and Douvere, 2009a, p. 20). This approach is aimed ‘to create and establish a more rational use of marine space and the interactions between its uses, to balance demands for development with the need to protect the environment and to achieve social and economic objectives in an open and planned way’ (UNESCO, 2013). What MSP is promising, then, is a future-oriented planning process, which takes into account all the sectors related to the governance of maritime issues and allocates marine space both geographically and temporally for different purposes (interests), which are deemed politically desirable.