. 2018 Nov 14;48(8):816–830. doi: 10.1007/s13280-018-1103-2

Table 4.

Research needs in social sciences with regard to ocean acidification, key domains are highlighted

Research needs
• Identify the types and magnitude of market failures relevant to OA, their consequences, quantify their relative importance and interactions among them • Analyse the coherency and/or conflicts between the national, EU, and international legal and administrative systems relevant for OA • Further explore contradictions, overlaps, and gaps in existing institutional arrangements that cause OA, and how they can be amended, focusing on the legal and administrative feasibility including the degree of readiness to pursue required changes among concerned actors • Build a schematic understanding of how the existing regulations and management structures link to OA, and to each other and how current policy tools reinforce (or counteract) each other in the aim of changing human behaviour • Analyse whether increased public knowledge of the causes and consequences of OA, and policy tools to address this problem, could increase public policy support • Understand the importance of political–economic context for policy support, and how this interacts with individual-level mechanisms driving policy support and behavioural change • Develop knowledge on how to foster, evaluate and implement increased ecosystem resilience to OA through habitat repair and protection • Improved resource allocation strategies (e.g. transitional compensation systems, support to new activities, etc.), and identification of winners and losers among societal groups • Investigate the impacts of different measures on incentives for innovation in order to avoid lock-ins and maintenance of old structures that are not adapted to the new situation

Research needs

• Identify the types and magnitude of market failures relevant to OA, their consequences, quantify their relative importance and interactions among them

• Analyse the coherency and/or conflicts between the national, EU, and international legal and administrative systems relevant for OA

• Further explore contradictions, overlaps, and gaps in existing institutional arrangements that cause OA, and how they can be amended, focusing on the legal and administrative feasibility including the degree of readiness to pursue required changes among concerned actors

• Build a schematic understanding of how the existing regulations and management structures link to OA, and to each other and how current policy tools reinforce (or counteract) each other in the aim of changing human behaviour

• Analyse whether increased public knowledge of the causes and consequences of OA, and policy tools to address this problem, could increase public policy support

• Understand the importance of political–economic context for policy support, and how this interacts with individual-level mechanisms driving policy support and behavioural change

• Develop knowledge on how to foster, evaluate and implement increased ecosystem resilience to OA through habitat repair and protection

• Improved resource allocation strategies (e.g. transitional compensation systems, support to new activities, etc.), and identification of winners and losers among societal groups

• Investigate the impacts of different measures on incentives for innovation in order to avoid lock-ins and maintenance of old structures that are not adapted to the new situation