Environmental Movements,Market-Based Approaches,and Neoliberalization

Abstract

Market-based approaches have become a prominent strategy of environmental movement organizations. This article proposes that such approaches contribute to neoliberalization and its legitimation. Using a case study of the sustainable seafood movement and its use of market-based approaches, this article analyzes the ways that the movement’s consumer, restaurant, and retailer campaigns contribute to and legitimate neoliberalization. Specifically, in using market-based approaches, sustainable seafood organizations are contributing to and legitimating neoliberal notions of individualism, marketization, and the devolution of regulatory authority. Given such findings, I argue that the sustainable seafood movement is “in the market and for it.” As such, I suggest the movement’s transformative capacity may be limited, and in using market-based approaches it may be facilitating processes of capitalist accumulation that environmental sociologists have widely identified as antithetical to environmental sustainability.

Keywords

environmental movements marine conservation neoliberalism markets fisheries and aquaculture

U.S. environmental movement organizations (EMOs) have increasingly turned to the market to try to achieve their objectives (Bartley, 2003; Cashore, Auld, & Newsom, 2004; O’Rourke, 2005).¹ Using a variety of approaches, a key strategy of EMOs has become to try to shift demand in the marketplace toward goods that are more sustainable. The idea is that such market shifts will exert pressure on upstream actors to implement more sustainable practices and, thus, reduce environmental degradation. Taylor (2005, p. 130) contends that in using market-based approaches social and environmental movements attempt to be “in the market, but not for it.” That is, movement organizations are trying to strategically use the market to achieve their objectives “without being captured by the market’s conventional logic, practices, and dominant actors” (Taylor, 2005, p. 130). Using a case study of the sustainable seafood movement, however, this article contends that U.S. EMOs are “in the market and for it.”

The sustainable seafood movement is one part of the environmental movement and consists of organizations that seek to conserve fisheries and marine environments primarily through the use of market-based approaches. The movement emerged in the late 1990s in response to a lack of success pressuring the state and changes in political and economic conditions. Regarding the latter, the economic sector that the sustainable seafood movement is trying to reform—the agrifood sector—has experienced widespread neoliberal restructuring (Busch, 2010; Guthman, 2008). This has produced both a closing of political opportunities and the emergence of opportunities for the use of market-based approaches. While not all marine conservation organizations use market-based approaches, the sustainable seafood movement has become the most prominent component of marine conservation efforts in the United States today.²

Although a partial response to neoliberalization, the use of market-based approaches by the sustainable seafood movement is also congruent with neoliberal theory and practices. Building on the Weberian (1978) notion of legitimacy as a collective process through which actors and ideas gain credence, this article argues that sustainable seafood organizations’ use of market-based approaches contribute to neoliberalization and its legitimation. Specifically, I contend that in using market-based approaches, the sustainable seafood movement is—often unintentionally—“endorsing” key tenets of neoliberalization.³ Most notably, these include individualism, marketization, and the devolution of regulatory authority. Thus, whereas neoliberalization is an ongoing and negotiated process (Peck, 2010), the use of market-based approaches tend to treat neoliberalization as if it is “fated, inescapable, and evolutionary” (Heynen & Robbins, 2005, p. 6). The implication is, I argue, the further neoliberalization of society and environmentalism.

In concluding, I suggest that the neoliberalization of sustainable seafood organizations that has taken place with the turn to the market constrains the transformative capacities of the sustainable seafood movement. Specifically, I suggest that in turning to market-based approaches the sustainable seafood movement has become captured by the market. As such, it functions within the boundaries of capitalist political economies, which environmental sociologists have shown are antithetical to environmental sustainability (Foster, Clark, & York, 2009; Gould, Pellow, & Schnaiberg, 2008; O’Connor, 1998). As such, the market-based approaches being used by sustainable seafood organizations may facilitate the environmentally degrading practices that they are seeking to counter.

The remaining sections of the article are organized as follows. First, I review the literature on neoliberalism, with particular attention given to the ideas of neoliberalization and the conceptualization of neoliberalization as a two-stage process (i.e., “roll-back” and “roll-out”; Peck & Tickell, 2002). Three facets of neoliberalism are identified as pertinent to understanding and analyzing EMO’s use of market-based approaches: (a) individualism, (b) marketization, and (c) the devolution of regulatory authority. Second, I briefly outline the environmental impacts of commercial fishing and aquaculture. Third, I provide an overview of the sustainable seafood movement, its shift to market-based approaches, and the kinds of market-based approaches it uses. Fourth, I analyze the ways that the market-based approaches of the sustainable seafood movement are congruent with neoliberalization. Specifically, how the movement’s market-based approaches embrace the core neoliberal ideas of (a) individualism, (b) marketization, and (c) the devolution of regulatory authority are examined. In concluding, I discuss the ways that the sustainable seafood movement’s choice of market-based approaches constrains the kind of changes it seeks to achieve and contributes to the ongoing neoliberalization of society and environmental management.

Method

Data on the use of market-based approaches by sustainable seafood organizations was gathered using multiple qualitative methods.⁴ First, 31 in-depth interviews were conducted with representatives from 23 different organizations that were active in the sustainable seafood movement. Initial interviewees were identified through a contact who was active in the movement and analysis of movement documents. A snowball sampling technique was then used to identify additional participants. As the movement was comparatively small at the time of field research in 2005-2006, an official from most organizations active in the sustainable seafood movement participated in the study. Officials included the head of organizations for many smaller EMOs and the person in charge of either marine conservation overall or specific campaigns for larger organizations. Generally, interviewees were questioned as to the kinds of approaches their organizations used, why their organizations choose such approaches, and advantages and disadvantages to different kinds of approaches. Second, participant-observation was undertaken wherever possible. This included attending movement related activities and events, such as public presentations and meetings. Last, movement documents, including press releases, newspaper advertisements, reports, brochures, newsletters, and websites were examined. While some of this data were private internal movement documents, much of it was public. Specifically, document analysis provided data on how movement organizations undertook framing of issues and campaigns. Consistent with a grounded theory approach (Charmaz, 2003), data from all three sources were entered into the qualitative software program NVivo and coded.⁵

Neoliberalism

Neoliberalism is a political economic theory centered on individual rights, free markets and trade, and private property. In short, its proponents argue that the good of society can be maximized through individuals maximizing their self-interest, which is best achieved through the market. Today, the discourse of neoliberalism permeates all facets of society, from the political to the cultural (Harvey, 2005; Heynen & Robbins, 2005; Jessop, 2002a; McCarthy & Prudham, 2004; Peck & Tickell, 2002). Yet in practice neoliberalism is far from hegemonic. Rather, in most countries, including the United States, one finds a mix of neoliberal practices with more Keynesian ones (Harvey, 2005; Peck, 2010). Put differently, neoliberalism is not a thing or an end-state, but an ongoing process (i.e., neoliberalization). Among other things, this means that what constitutes neoliberal ideology and practice is also fluid (Heynen & Robbins, 2005; Peck & Tickell, 2002).

A large part of neoliberalization has entailed a reduction and discrediting of social welfare and Keynesian policies, what Peck and Tickell (2002) term rollback neoliberalization. In particular, rollback neoliberalization has been characterized by privatization, deregulation, and liberalization. For EMOs, such changes have resulted in a decline of political opportunities, as states become less willing and capable of enacting and enforcing environmental regulation (Bartley, 2003; Harvey, 1989). Peck and Tickell (2002) contend that in many countries, including the United States, neoliberalization has entered a second stage, what they term roll-out neoliberalization. While the core ideological tenets of neoliberalism remain in place, roll-out neoliberalization has entailed the reregulation of much of the economy. However, instead of state-led regulation, current forms of regulation tend to take the form of nonstate, market-driven governance (Cashore et al., 2004; Peck & Tickell, 2007). In other words, increasingly a combination of corporations, industry associations, social movement organizations, and certification bodies are responsible for both developing and enforcing regulations (Bartley, 2007; McCarthy & Prudham, 2004; Swyngedouw, Page, & Kaika, 2002). This has led to the creation of a new set of opportunities for EMOs centered on market-based approaches (Schurman, 2004). Thus, the turn to market-based approaches by U.S. EMOs has been, at least, partially a response to changing opportunity structures as a result of ongoing neoliberalization.

Three facets of neoliberalization are particularly pertinent to the analysis of the use of market-based approaches by EMOs. First, a cornerstone of neoliberalism is a strong notion of individualism, where people are free to pursue their self-interests in entrepreneurial ways. One form this has taken in the United States, and across much of the world, is the construction of people as primarily consumers, as opposed to citizens, residents, or members of a group. Hence, with neoliberalization, consumption has emerged as a leading form of agency in contemporary society (Cochoy, 2005; Holzer, 2006; Micheletti, 2004; Szasz, 2007). Second, there has been the continual extension of markets into areas previously outside the market with neoliberalization (i.e., marketization). The result is that cultural practices, social processes, and the environment are increasingly conceptualized as commodities. This means that their value is calculated economically and they are acquired and regulated through markets (Clausen, & Longo, 2012; Foster et al., 2009). Third, under neoliberalization, responsibility for environmental regulation has increasingly been devolved to nonstate actors. Thus, environmental regulation is increasingly the purview of private actors, or is a joint public–private undertaking, and relies on market-based mechanisms, such as third-party certification (Cashore et al., 2004; Gunningham, Phillipson, & Grabosky, 1999; Hatanaka, 2010).

Given that neoliberalization “is a socially produced, historically and geographically specific, crisis-driven, conjunctural, and definitionally incomplete phenomenon” (Peck, & Tickell, 2007, p. 28), it requires continual legitimation. Broadly defined, legitimacy is the process through which objects, process, and practices gain credibility (Weber, 1978). This means to be deemed legitimate, neoliberalization needs to be viewed as credible, valid, and appropriate by relevant groups. The argument of this article is that in using market-based approaches U.S. EMOs are contributing to neoliberalization and its legitimacy. Specifically, by using the market, they are signaling that the market is the appropriate mechanism for environmental governance, and thus, U.S. EMOs are helping to legitimate neoliberalization. The sections below examine how the market-based approaches of the sustainable seafood movement are constructed on and legitimate the following tenets of neoliberalization: individualism, marketization, and the devolution of regulatory authority.

Fisheries, Aquaculture, and the Environment

Fisheries and marine environments have been and continue to be severely degraded (Clausen & Clark, 2005; Food and Agriculture Organization, 2010; Jackson et al., 2001; Pauly et al., 2003). Since the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) began monitoring fish stocks in the 1970s, the number of fish stocks fully exploited or overexploited has progressively increased. In 2010, the FAO (2010) estimated that 53% of the world’s fish stocks were fully exploited (at their maximum sustainable limits), 28% overexploited, and 3% depleted. In its 2010 State of the World Fisheries and Aquaculture Report, the FAO (2010, p. 8) states that “this combined percentage [fully exploited, overexploited, and depleted] is the highest” since they started monitoring fisheries and that such findings “give cause for concern.” Moreover, some marine scientists contend that such measurements fail to capture the actual degree of environmental degradation that is taking place in that they do not take into account the degree of ecological disorganization and loss of biodiversity that is resulting from declining fish stocks (Pauly, Christensen, Dalsgaard, Froese, & Torres, 1998; Worm et al., 2006). From this perspective, then, the ecological health of the oceans is potentially worse than commonly understood.

While aquaculture is often viewed as a potential solution to problems of overfishing, aquaculture also has negative environmental impacts. Similar to industrialized agriculture, some forms of aquaculture also require significant inputs. For example, the majority of fish oil and a large percentage of fishmeal serve as feed for aquaculture (Naylor, Eagle, & Smith, 2003; Wilkinson, 2006). Thus, much of aquaculture generates additional fishing pressure, particularly on pelagic fisheries. Additionally, much of aquaculture uses chemical inputs, such as antibiotics, fungicides, and pesticides, and such inputs have negative effects on surrounding ecosystems. Last, aquaculture is also leading to deforestation and the conversion of coastal ecosystems into monocultural production sites (e.g., shrimp; Barbier, 2003; Stonich & Vandergeest, 2001).

The Sustainable Seafood Movement

Despite the widespread degradation of fisheries and marine environments, marine life and habitat have historically received significantly less attention from U.S. EMOs than other forms of environmental degradation. Consequently, marine conservation continues to be a relatively small component of the U.S. environmental movement. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, a group of EMOs working on marine conservation came together to form what movement members commonly referred to as the “sustainable seafood movement.”⁶ The organizations active in the sustainable seafood movement are quite diverse, including large global mainstream EMOs such as Environmental Defense and the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), organizations dedicated solely to marine conservation (e.g., SeaWeb and the Blue Ocean Institute), various grassroots organizations, and several aquariums (see Table 1).⁷

Table 1.

Organizations Active in the Sustainable Seafood Movement (2005-2006).

General Environmental Organizations	Marine Conversation Organizations	Aquariums and Other Nontraditional Movement Organizations	Agriculture and Food Organizations	Certified Organizations
Environmental Defense	SeaWeb	New England Aquarium	Center for Food Safety	Marine Stewardship Council
World Wildlife Fund	Pew Institute for Ocean Science	Ecofish	Chefs Collaborative
National Environmental Trust	Blue Ocean Institute	Monterey Bay Aquarium	Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy
National Resource Defense Council	Coastal Alliance for Aquaculture Reform	Sea Change Investment Fund
Ecotrust	Sustainable Fishery Advocates
	Oceania

Prior to the emergence of the sustainable seafood movement, sustainable seafood organizations largely used more traditional state-based approaches and grassroots efforts. However, in the late 1990s, several factors spurred many organizations to begin to experiment with market-based approaches. First, and most important, was a lack of success using more traditional stated-centered approaches to advance marine conservation. As one movement official commented,

If you look at the history of U.S. fisheries over the 1980s and early 1990s there were not a lot of really positive results. That was during the collapse of groundfish stocks, lobster was in bad shape, tuna were still mismanaged.

Many interviewees commented that they thought that marine conservation had reached a turning point with the passage of the Sustainable Fisheries Act in 1996.⁸ However, the marine conservation movement soon realized that the Sustainable Fisheries Act was not the watershed movement they hoped it would be. According to interviewees, since nearly its passage, marine conservation organizations have been taking “defensive action” to prevent the rolling back of the act in the face of industry pressure and resistant politicians. At this point, one prominent leader of the sustainable seafood movement argued, “It became painfully apparent that relying on public policy to save the oceans was a mistake. We needed to find new approaches to create incentives for conservation.” Seeing what forestry activists were doing with market-based approaches, some leaders in marine conservation began to advocate for the use of market-based approaches.

At the same time that marine conservation organizations were beginning to look for new approaches, developments in the food sector were creating opportunities for the use of market-based strategies. Concentration and consolidation were both increasing the power of retailers and making them more vulnerable to market changes and disruptions. Additionally, competition on quality was leading retailers to diversify product offerings, including carrying a greater array of sustainable products (Konefal, Bain, Mascarenhas, & Busch, 2007). Additionally, consumer concern regarding food and how it is produced was also increasing at this time (Murdoch & Miele, 1999). Seeking to take advantage of opportunities offered by such developments, marine conversation organizations began to experiment with strategies that focused on retailers and consumers. Today, retailer- and consumer-based strategies, as well as ones focused on restaurants, are the most prominent approaches in marine conservation.

Last, foundations, which are a crucial source of funding for marine conservation organizations, were instrumental in the formation of the sustainable seafood movement. Most notable are the David and Lucile Packard Foundation and Pew Charitable Trusts, which both shifted the majority of their marine conservation funding to market-based approaches beginning in the late 1990s. Unhappy with the lack of progress using state-centered approaches, the Packard Foundation launched a market-based funding campaign in 1999 titled the “Seafood Choice Initiative” (Bridgespan Group, 2005). Partly modeled on the work by forestry advocates (e.g., campaigns to get big box retailers to carry more Forest Stewardship Council certified lumber), the Seafood Choice Initiative provided $37 million in funding with 60% ($23 million) coming from Packard for the following five market-based approaches: (a) certification, (b) consumer and gatekeeper education, (c) single-species campaigns, (d) business–environmental organization partnerships, and (e) markets campaigns (Bridgespan Group, 2005). The impact of Packard’s Seafood Choice Initiative is seen in that prior to it there were almost no market-based strategies in the area of marine and ocean conservation.⁹ Whereas in 2006 market-based strategies had become the most prominent approach used in marine conservation, with every market-based strategy undertaken by the sustainable seafood movement, except one, being partially funded by the Packard Foundation.

The Pew Charitable Trust was also instrumental in channeling marine conservation organizations toward market-based strategies. Most notable is that two of the lead organizations in the movement were established by Pew: the National Environmental Trust and SeaWeb.¹⁰ As several movement organizers noted, in establishing the National Environmental Trust and SeaWeb, Pew’s objective was to develop a more market-oriented approach in marine conservation. For example, one interviewee familiar with SeaWeb noted that it was founded to do “public relations for the environment” and “social marketing.” At the time of research, both organizations were among the most prominent and active organizations in the sustainable seafood movement.

Sustainable seafood organizations have implemented a large number of market-based initiatives. The initiatives can be divided into two categories: demand-oriented and supply-oriented. Demand-oriented initiatives seek to shift the market for and consumption of seafood toward more sustainable options. As of 2006, sustainable seafood organizations have used two kinds of demand-oriented approaches. On the one hand, there have been several single-species campaigns. The focus of single-species campaigns has either been a fishery that is in significant danger of ecological collapse, such as Patagonian Toothfish (i.e., Chilean Seabass), or seafood products produced using forms of aquaculture that have negative environmental impacts, such as farmed salmon. As of 2006, there had been five single-species campaigns: “Give a Swordfish a Break,” “Take a Pass on Chilean Seabass,” “Caviar Emptor,” “Farmed and Dangerous,” and “Pure Salmon.” Each single-species campaign tended to use a combination of strategies, including consumer education, working with and/or targeting retailers, enrolling restaurants and chefs, media campaigns, as well as pressuring the state to enact new policies. While single-species campaigns were a prominent early strategy of the sustainable seafood movement, the movement has since moved away from them.¹¹

In addition to single-species campaigns, movement organizations have used demand-oriented campaigns that focus more generally on shifting the entire market for seafood toward more sustainable options. These campaigns have taken one of three forms. The first general demand-oriented campaign is seafood cards and consumer education. Seafood cards are wallet-sized cards that categorize seafood according to its sustainability. The basic notion behind the cards is that consumers will consult them to help them purchase seafood that is sustainable.¹² Second, there have been initiatives aimed at getting restaurants to offer more sustainable seafood options and celebrity chefs to become public spokespersons for sustainable seafood. Last, there have been various efforts to get retailers to shift their seafood offerings in more sustainable directions. These efforts tend to be private negotiations between sustainable seafood organizations and retailers and only become public once an agreement has been reached. Recently, this has become the central approach of the movement.

In addition to these demand-oriented initiatives, the movement has also worked to create a supply of sustainable seafood. Here, the primary form this has taken is the establishment of a private governance body, the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC).¹³ The MSC was established in 1997 by several sustainable seafood organizations and the transnational corporation, Unilever, and has received significant funding from the Packard Foundation. The idea behind the MSC was to create an agreed on standard for what constitutes sustainable fishing, mechanisms to ensure that certified fisheries do in fact meet the standard, and to promote the consumption of sustainable seafood by supplying a product that consumers can trust. To accomplish this, the MSC develops environmental and traceability standards for sustainable fishing and accredits third-party certifiers to certify fisheries against such standards.¹⁴

Analysis: Market-Based Approaches and Neoliberalism

Having little success pressuring the state, sustainable seafood organizations have turned to market-based approaches in an attempt to have a greater impact on fisheries and aquaculture. In doing so, they are hoping to take advantage of opportunities presented by restructuring in the food sector to bypass uncooperative governments. Specifically, using a variety of strategies, including consumer education, and collaborations with retailers and restaurants, movement organizations are trying to create market incentives for more sustainable forms of fishing and aquaculture. While such market-based approaches may lead to improvements in the sustainability of fisheries and aquaculture, my findings indicate that they are also congruent with the neoliberalization of society and environmental governance. As such, they contribute to processes of ongoing neoliberalization and legitimate them.

The following three subsections examine the core neoliberal ideas of individualism, marketization, and the devolution of regulatory authority and the ways that the market-based approaches of the sustainable seafood movement are both based on and support such ideas. First, consumer-oriented market-based approaches that provide consumers with information on the sustainability of seafood so that they can make informed decisions is a key strategy used by many organizations in the sustainable seafood movement. In asking people to act as consumers by strategically using their purchasing power, the emphasis in such approaches is on the neoliberal notion of individualism and the difference that individual action can make. A second key strategy of the movement is working collaboratively with retailers, restaurants, and industry. One outcome of this approach has been acceptance by the sustainable seafood movement of the institutional centrality of the market. Last, through the MSC and partnerships with retailers, the sustainable seafood movement is developing private standards to govern the sustainability of fisheries and aquaculture. Under such an approach, conserving marine fisheries and environments becomes a question of constructing the right kinds of markets, as opposed to getting the right policies enacted. Thus, in using private forms of governance, the sustainable seafood movement is contributing to the neoliberal practice of devolving authority to nonstate actors. Each of these three processes is examined below.

Individualism: Promoting Consumption

The primary way that movement organizations have asked people to participate in marine conservation is through what they consume. Specifically, movement organizations have encouraged people to become knowledgeable about the sustainability of seafood (i.e., carrying and consulting seafood cards) and make “good” choices in their seafood consumption.¹⁵ Most interviewees stressed that what their organizations are trying to do is to empower individuals to make a difference by providing information. For example, describing her organization’s approach, one interviewee remarked, “Our whole thing is that we’re just going to give you the information, you make the decision. And, in doing so, you own that decision.” In the same vein, another organizer in the movement remarked, “[Our organization] always believes that you have to go and give everyone a chance to make the decision on his or her own.” Thus, the approach of sustainable seafood organizations to consumers has largely been passive in that they provide information but leave the decisions on how to act (or not act) on that information up to consumers. One movement member’s remark summarizes this point: “We’re not telling people what to do and what not to do,” because “people don’t like to be told what to do.”

In addition to the hands-off approach, sustainable seafood organizations also frame changes in individual’s consumption as a temporary activity. Specifically, in their messaging, many organizations indicated that people only have to change their consumption choices temporarily, and once seafood populations recover or industry practices are reformed, they can resume consumption. In other words, people do not have to give up the seafood that they love permanently. Making this point, one interviewee commented,

Yes, we will tell you when it is okay to eat the product. . . . So people feel like well if I just do this for awhile, I can be effective and then I can go back to eating it.

Such messaging indicates, first, that the level of seafood consumption is not a problem. Rather, it is just a question of the “right” kinds of seafood consumption. Second, it indicates that temporary shifts in consumption habits are sufficient for achieving sustainable levels of marine conservation. Put differently, neither lifestyle nor structural changes are necessary to sustain fisheries.

However, given the current environmental conditions of many fisheries (FAO, 2010; Pauly et al., 2003), such an approach may have a limited impact (Jacquet & Pauly, 2007). For example, while seafood consumption has declined slightly in the last decade in the United States, long-term per capita consumption has increased from between 12 and 13 pounds in 1980 to 15.8 pounds in 2009 (Urner Barry, 2010). Globally, fish consumption has increased even more dramatically. According to the FAO, “(T)otal food fish supply has increased at an annual rate of 3.1 percent since 1961, while the world population has increased by 1.7 percent per year in the same period” (FAO, 2010, p. 64). This translates into a per capita increase from 9.9 kg in the 1960s to 17.0 kg in 2007 (FAO, 2010). Given that exploitation of fisheries has paralleled the increase in consumption of seafood, a permanent reduction in seafood consumption, and not just the “right” kind of consumption and temporary shifts in consumption, may be necessary for sustainable fisheries.

In advocating temporary individual action as a central mechanism for sustaining fisheries and marine environments, the sustainable seafood movement is promoting and reinforcing neoliberal notions of individualism. To reiterate, in neoliberal theory, institutional structures are rolled-back to free individuals’ entrepreneurial spirit. In this way, individuals are able to maximize their own self-interests, and in doing so, also those of society. One outcome is that people are increasingly trying to protect themselves and their families from risks through their consumptive practices—that is, what Szasz (2007) terms inverted quarantine. Rather than partaking in collective action, Szasz contends that people are shopping their way to safety through, for example, buying bottled water and living in gated communities. In instructing consumers to consume the right kind of seafood, as opposed to organize, partake in collective action, and demand the stronger regulation of fisheries, the sustainable seafood movement is promoting similar kinds of individual actions that Szasz critically highlights. The result is that environmental change becomes “simply a matter of individual will rather than something that must be organized and struggled over in collectivities” (Allen & Guthman, 2006, pp. 411-412). In short, movement organizations are contributing to the neoliberal performance of individual responsibility in their consumer campaigns.

Marketization: Collaborative Approaches and Market Acceptance

Generally, sustainable seafood organizations have favored the use of cooperative strategies in their use of market-based strategies.¹⁶ That is, they tend to work with industry—as opposed to against industry—in conciliatory and collaborative ways. In using such approaches, the aim of sustainable seafood organizations is to partner with industry as a way to get them to implement more sustainable practices. To date, the primary form this has taken is private negotiations between environmental organizations and retailers and food service companies (e.g., Darden Restaurants and Bon Appétit Management Company) to develop standards, commit to purchasing MSC certified seafood, or provide recommendations on seafood sourcing.¹⁷

The primary reason for the strong preference by many organizations for nonconfrontational approaches is that such approaches allow for the development of potentially long-term collaborative relationships with retailers and restaurants. A majority of interviewees indicated that such relationships were important as they enabled long-term incremental change, which was viewed as the best method for sustaining fisheries and marine environments. For example, in discussing his organization’s preference for working with industry, one interviewee remarked, “As a conservation organization, if there is an opportunity for improvement, it seems like you got to take it. Are we selling out to big industry? I think we are selling out to improvement. That’s our job.” Similarly, other interviewees stressed that the key was getting some commitment from retailers and restaurants. For instance, in speaking about her organization’s work with restaurants, one movement organizer stressed, “We don’t expect perfection and we’re never going to ask for it. . . . If we can get chefs to take off one bad and replace it with one good, that’s encouragement.” Interviewees stressed that such a collaborative and flexible approach was key to building relationships, which would then create opportunities for future collaborations.

While building relationships with retailers, restaurants, and industry may bring about positive changes in the long-term management of fisheries, the strong emphasis on building collaborative relationships has also resulted in much of the sustainable seafood movement accepting market practices. Below, three examples are presented on how the emphasis on working with industry has led to framing and messaging by the sustainable seafood that does not question market practices.

First, the strong tendencies toward nonconfrontational and collaborative approaches by most sustainable seafood organizations have affected the framing and messaging used by the movement. This is particularly evident in the strong avoidance of the term boycott by almost every movement organization. The primary reason given by interviewees for avoiding boycotts was that they tended to generate strong counter-reactions. Several interviewees commented that industry tends to see boycotts in black and white terms, and often perceives them as an attempt to hurt their business. For example, in discussing the first single-species campaign, “Give a Swordfish a Break,’ one movement organizer commented:

“Give Swordfish a Break” pissed off a lot of people. It really angered fisherman, it really angered the fishing industry in general, and even some chefs, because it was really a boycott. It was a boycott done in a different way in that we didn’t say stop eating forever. Just stop eating for a little while.

Thus, since the swordfish campaign, movement organizations have been very careful to avoid their messaging being perceived as a call for boycotts. Rather, interviewees stressed that their organizations were not trying to “shut industry down,” but saying “it needs to be reformed.” For instance, in describing her organization’s relationship with a larger retailer, one movement organizer commented, “It is not trying to boycott a particular thing, but helping them improve what they are doing around farmed salmon and working with best farms versus just saying all farmed salmon is bad.” In short, there was a belief among many in the movement that critical and negative messaging, such as boycotts, that threatened market share and profitability would anger and alienate retailers and industry.¹⁸

A second example of how the inclination toward nonconfrontational and collaborative approaches led to market acceptance by the sustainable seafood movement is the way organizations frame seafood consumption. Specifically, the message is never that the quantity of seafood consumption has to be lowered. For example, general consumer education campaigns, such as seafood cards, focus on encouraging consumers to make sustainable choices. Nowhere on the cards are people encouraged to eat less seafood. Similarly, while single-species campaigns focused on reducing consumption of a particular seafood product, none of them ever advocated for lower consumption of seafood generally. In part, advocating for decreased consumption has been avoided by movement organizations because it threatens the profitability of retailers and industry, whereas shifting consumption does not, or minimally does.¹⁹ Put differently, framing the degradation of fisheries as a problem of overconsumption of seafood potentially threatens collaborative arrangements with retailers and the fishing industry. Yet given the conditions of fisheries, movement organization’s strong emphasis on working with industry is creating a potential disjuncture between movement messaging and the environmental conditions of fisheries. That is, given the steady increase in seafood consumption globally over the last 50 years, curbing consumption may also be crucial to achieve high levels of marine sustainability.

Last, with some exceptions, the dominant frame used by sustainable seafood organizations in approaching retailers is that sustainability is a good business practice. For example, one interviewee remarked that when her organization approaches retailers, their message is the following:

With the gourmet food stores we have been talking to, we don’t come in with an environment sales thing. Like do something good for the world. We don’t even bother. It’s all just like, here’s the data, this labeling does this and this and this. It’s an awesome marketing tool for you. Here’s the data of how it changes your sales. And as a little bonus you are doing something good for the oceans.

In short, the message to retailers and industry is that operating and/or sourcing more sustainably is good for business. While such an approach might garner the support of some retailers and some industry actors, it is also constrained by the extent to which sustainability enhances profitability. In other words, sustainable seafood needs to be profitable, if retailers are to sell it, and fishing and aquaculture companies are to use sustainable practices. Additionally, profitability concerns may also constrain how much sustainable seafood retailers will sell and the extent to which fishing and aquaculture companies will implement sustainable practices. For example, it needs to be emphasized that although some retailers have made commitments to sell more sustainable seafood in response to movement actions, nearly all continue to sell unsustainable seafood simultaneously.

The strong emphasis on collaborating with retailers and industry indicates that the sustainable seafood movement views sustaining fisheries as possible within current neoliberal arrangements. Put differently, environmentally friendly fishing and aquaculture is a question of creating the right market incentives. Such an approach may constrain the sustainable seafood movement in that it has to abide by the logic and practices of the market. Most notably, sustainable seafood has to be profitable if companies are to make commitments to it. Thus, with such an approach, the potential exists for the market, and its most powerful actors (i.e., large corporations), to become the arbitrators of sustainability.

Devolution of Authority

While the turn to market-based approaches was partially necessitated by a lack of success pressuring governments and changing political economic conditions, today, many sustainable seafood organizations have embraced such approaches as the most effective strategy to improving the sustainability of fisheries. From the perspective of movement organizations, market-based approaches have two advantages compared with state-centered approaches. First, they were viewed as capable of achieving results faster than state-centered approaches. Generally, interviewees viewed government as a slow and messy institution, whereas using the market was perceived as more efficient. The following quote by one activist is illustrative of this position:

With government, particularly in the situation where you don’t have sympathetic lawmakers or administration, it can take a very long time [to get change]. And the risk is high. . . . If there are economic interests that don’t like what you did, they will spend their time trying to undo it. So you have to watchdog what you do.

Markets were partly seen as more efficient because they enabled movement organizations to work directly with actors that either sell seafood or catch and produce it. For example, in speaking about the advantages of market-based approaches, one movement organizer commented,

We’re more effective in that we’re a major step closer to fishermen. We can go with the purchasers and go out to the fishing vessels and they can say, “I’ll only take fish if you take it this way.” And it’s much faster that way. The time scale of government bureaucracy is slow.

In short, congruent with neoliberal ideology, many interviewees viewed governments as slow and convoluted, and markets as more efficient.

Second, several interviewees also commented that higher levels of sustainability were possible through market-based approaches. Private standards were often seen as potentially more efficacious than governmental regulations, which interviewees tended to note became watered down as a result of having to strike compromises between different groups. Expressing this position, one movement organizer commented, “I think, in part, the environmental community has recognized that while environmental laws are useful, they often set the floor. Rather than reaching for the ceiling in terms of what they can achieve.” In other words, whereas state-centered approaches were understood as generally resulting in weak regulations, the market was viewed as holding the possibility for the enactment of more stringent standards.

Market-based standards have taken two forms to date. On the one hand, there are private retailer standards, which are often developed in conjunction with sustainable seafood organizations. On the other hand, there is a set of environmental standards developed by the independent governance body, the MSC, for wild caught fisheries. Both of these approaches—private retailer standards and independent third-party standards—enable the sustainable seafood movement, as well as industry, to bypass government in order to implement environmental standards for fisheries and aquaculture.

It remains an open question whether nonstate forms of governance will produce faster change and achieve higher levels of sustainability than government regulation. However, an unintended consequence of the sustainable seafood movement’s use of private forms of governance may be both the further weakening of the regulatory capacity of states and the legitimation of such action. First, while movement members generally acknowledged that getting laws enacted remained important, this was secondary to constructing the right kinds of markets. Consistent with roll-out neoliberalization, the key to sustaining fisheries has largely become constructing markets that encourage sustainability. This entails the development and implementation of nonstate market-driven forms of governance, such as private standards either through the MSC, or as the previous section indicated, working collaboratively with retailers. In both instances, the sustainable seafood is contributing to the devolution of authority from states to private actors in that the sustainable seafood movement is empowering itself, the MSC, and retailers to develop and implement regulations to govern the sustainability of fisheries and aquaculture.

Conclusion

Peck and Tickell (2007) observe,

If the project of neoliberalization has been sustained, and its contradictions managed, by the selective incorporation of various “flanking mechanisms” like community governance, social capital, and the social economy (Jessop, 2002b), then there is a sense in which these “outsides” of neoliberalism are inescapably on the “inside,” that neoliberalization is partly constituted by and through its “others.” Like the idealized market to which it pays homage, neoliberalism cannot stand alone. (p. 34)

This article provides empirical support to Peck and Tickell’s (2007) argument that “neoliberalism cannot stand alone” in that it demonstrates how a single environmental movement—the sustainable seafood movement—in its use of market-based approaches is contributing to the ongoing neoliberalization of U.S. society and its legitimation. Specifically, the sustainable seafood movement is contributing to and legitimating three aspects of neoliberalization. First, in promoting consumption as the primary form of action by people to help increase the sustainability of the oceans, movement organizations are encouraging strong constructions of individualism and individual agency. Second, in seeking to gain the support of large retailers, the sustainable seafood movement tends to be in the market and for it. As such, it is supporting and promoting the ongoing marketization of U.S. society. Last, in largely bypassing government in favor of market forms of governance, the movement is complicit with the ongoing devolution of regulatory responsibilities from the state. Thus, by operating within the boundaries of neoliberalism, the sustainable seafood movement is providing legitimation to the ongoing, constructed, and incomplete project of neoliberalization. The result is a reinforcement of the understanding of neoliberalization as “fated, inescapable, and evolutionary” (Heynen & Robbins, 2005, p. 6), and thus, a constraining of the kinds of changes and actions that are viewed as feasible by social and environmental organizations.

In concluding, I extend the above analysis and discuss the ways that operating within the boundaries of neoliberalism constrains the transformative ability of the sustainable seafood movement. Despite some success in increasing consumer awareness regarding the environmental degradation of fisheries, agreements with several retailers and restaurants to source more sustainable seafood, and the certification of 178 fisheries by the MSC (2012), the significant degradation of fisheries and marine environments largely continues. To date, at best, what has occurred is a partial greening of the market for seafood. More specifically, the seafood market has not shifted but simply become more diverse. As one movement organizer commented, this indicates that there is now a “menu of options for consumers” ranging from sustainable to unsustainable seafood. Thus, what is currently taking place is that the market for seafood are becoming more diversified with respect to sustainability and niche markets for sustainable seafood is proliferating. However, this does not mean that the collective market for seafood has become more sustainable. For example, many of the most unsustainable kinds of seafood, such as farmed shrimp and salmon, remain among the best selling seafood products (Urner Barry, 2010). Furthermore, the total consumption of seafood continues to increase.

Political economic theories in environmental sociology forcefully argue that capitalism and environmental sustainability are contradictory projects (Foster et al., 2009; Gould et al., 2008; O’Connor, 1998). Generally, processes of capitalist accumulation and the competitive character of capitalism are conceptualized as creating incentives for environmental degradation. Given that the aim of neoliberalization is to free the market from external constraints, in contributing to neoliberalization, the sustainable seafood movement is also contributing to the deepening and extension of capitalist processes. For example, in its consumer education campaigns and retailer initiatives, the sustainable seafood movement is supporting processes of capital accumulation, such as commodification and consumption (Clausen & Longo, 2012; Foster et al., 2009). Additionally, in their various market-based campaigns, sustainable seafood movement organizations have largely ignored questions about total seafood consumption, corporate power, and market practices, all of which, at a minimum, require critical engagement with capitalist processes. In short, to borrow the language of the treadmill of production framework (Gould et al., 2008), the sustainable seafood movement is “lubricating” processes of capital accumulation by contributing to neoliberalization and its legitimation. As such, at the same time as movement organizations are trying to enhance the sustainably of fisheries, they are contributing to the processes that undergird the exploitation of fisheries.

While the above findings are based on a single case study, they point to potential limitations of market-based approaches for EMOs more broadly. Specifically, the case of the sustainable seafood movement indicates that the kinds of changes EMOs can achieve in using market-based approaches may be limited to ones that do not restrict processes of accumulation. At the same time, the sustainable seafood movement, as well as other market-based initiatives, such as fair trade and organics, demonstrates that market-based approaches can slow environmental degradation and have localized affects (e.g., particular fisheries and environments). Thus, while EMOs should not abandon market-based approaches given current political-economic conditions, the findings of this article indicate the need for an expanded repertoire of approaches by EMOs. Particularly, there is a need for approaches that challenge the norms, ideology, and practices of neoliberalized forms of capitalism as well as ones that promote non-neoliberal and non-capitalist orderings of society.

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Notes

Author Biography

Jason Konefal is an assistant professor in the Department of Sociology at Sam Houston State University. His research is concerned with how political economic changes affect opportunities and strategies for sustainability and social justice in food and agriculture.

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