Systemic coordination and the problem of seasonal harmful algal blooms in Lake Erie

Abstract

The management of natural resources may potentially be improved when governance structures in social-ecological systems enable coordination among multiple actors who may operate on the same or different geographic and/or governmental scales. In this article, we analyze the network of formal coordination ties that link governmental and nongovernmental actors in the Maumee River watershed, which is the largest source of phosphorus loading into Lake Erie, one of the five Laurentian Great Lakes of North America. Since the 1990s, Lake Erie has seen a return of the seasonal harmful algal blooms (HAB) that were common in the 1960s and 1970s, and considerable research suggests that they might be triggered by excessive amounts of phosphorus produced by agriculture. Analyzing an assortment of documents that collectively detail how stakeholders relate to each other on the topic of nutrient management in the watershed, we examine who are the actors that are more likely to fulfill coordination roles, and the scales at which coordination takes place (vertically vs horizontally). Results suggest that coordination has been formalized vertically, with actors who operate at higher governmental levels being more likely to coordinate the activities of actors at lower levels. In addition, we see evidence of horizontal coordination but only in the confines of the individual state jurisdictions that share the watershed. We see this as a potentially important obstacle to solving the HABs problem in Lake Erie, given that the management of interjurisdictional watersheds is likely to be ineffective in the absence of proper coordination across the different jurisdictions that share the watershed.