TY - JOUR

T1 - Repoliticising the Coast

T2 - A Post-Foundational Commentary on Integrative Governance and Blue Infrastructure

AU - Scheunpflug, Luca

AU - Gee, Kira

N1 - Publisher Copyright: © 2025 The Author(s). Geo: Geography and Environment published by the Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of British Geographers) and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

PY - 2025/7/1

Y1 - 2025/7/1

N2 - European coasts are contested spaces due to conflicting uses and impacts, prompting the introduction of Integrated Coastal Zone Management (ICZM) and Marine Spatial Planning (MSP). These governance frameworks aim to promote cooperation, resolve conflicts and ensure socio-ecological outcomes acceptable to multiple actors, even as large-scale blue infrastructure projects increasingly transform maritime environments. However, these integrative governance approaches have been criticised for promoting essentialist ‘blue growth’ as a dominant ontological and epistemological lens. Thereby, they contribute to shifting production and exploitation frontiers towards coastal and marine areas, prioritising market-based solutions while sidelining meaningful democratic participation. As a result, structural power asymmetries persist, leading to ongoing ecological degradation and the disenfranchisement of communities connected to coastal environments. Challenging the often-proclaimed inevitability of integration and its technocratic foundation, this paper highlights coastal governance's inherent yet unseen contingent—and therefore political—nature, arguing for its repoliticisation. Drawing on a post-foundationalist interpretation of political ontology and environmental justice, a conceptual framework is proposed to deconstruct depoliticisation, which is deeply embedded yet hidden in knowledge production around coastal environments. It underscores how dissent and difference can offer productive alternatives beyond path-dependent, growth-oriented approaches by emphasising injustices related to blue infrastructure planning and construction and their uncertain socio-ecological impacts. Illustrative case studies from the Spanish Mediterranean coast demonstrate how environmental justice movements around blue infrastructure projects, and their counter-narratives can disrupt depoliticisation and help to establish more just, and sustainable coastal environments.

AB - European coasts are contested spaces due to conflicting uses and impacts, prompting the introduction of Integrated Coastal Zone Management (ICZM) and Marine Spatial Planning (MSP). These governance frameworks aim to promote cooperation, resolve conflicts and ensure socio-ecological outcomes acceptable to multiple actors, even as large-scale blue infrastructure projects increasingly transform maritime environments. However, these integrative governance approaches have been criticised for promoting essentialist ‘blue growth’ as a dominant ontological and epistemological lens. Thereby, they contribute to shifting production and exploitation frontiers towards coastal and marine areas, prioritising market-based solutions while sidelining meaningful democratic participation. As a result, structural power asymmetries persist, leading to ongoing ecological degradation and the disenfranchisement of communities connected to coastal environments. Challenging the often-proclaimed inevitability of integration and its technocratic foundation, this paper highlights coastal governance's inherent yet unseen contingent—and therefore political—nature, arguing for its repoliticisation. Drawing on a post-foundationalist interpretation of political ontology and environmental justice, a conceptual framework is proposed to deconstruct depoliticisation, which is deeply embedded yet hidden in knowledge production around coastal environments. It underscores how dissent and difference can offer productive alternatives beyond path-dependent, growth-oriented approaches by emphasising injustices related to blue infrastructure planning and construction and their uncertain socio-ecological impacts. Illustrative case studies from the Spanish Mediterranean coast demonstrate how environmental justice movements around blue infrastructure projects, and their counter-narratives can disrupt depoliticisation and help to establish more just, and sustainable coastal environments.

KW - blue growth

KW - environmental justice movements

KW - ICZM

KW - MSP

KW - post-foundationalism

KW - repoliticisation

KW - Engineering

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=105023416220&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1002/geo2.70044

DO - 10.1002/geo2.70044

M3 - Journal articles

AN - SCOPUS:105023416220

VL - 12

JO - Geo: Geography and Environment

JF - Geo: Geography and Environment

SN - 2054-4049

IS - 2

M1 - e70044

ER -