Mental models of aquaculture governance in Indonesia

Abstract Aquaculture stakeholders have mental models, which are the internal cognitive representations of how they understand and prioritize the different features of their aquaculture systems. Individuals and stakeholder groups are likely to have different mental models, with implications for making cooperative governance work and guiding the rapidly emerging sector’s sustainable development. We apply a participatory approach called fuzzy cognitive mapping to capture and compare the mental models of community-based coastal pond aquaculture stakeholders in Indonesia, including farmers, government managers, and researchers who need to work together to govern a rapidly expanding aquaculture sector which faces critical sustainability challenges. To conceptually structure our comparison, we use Elinor Ostrom’s social–ecological systems framework. Our results highlight important differences between stakeholder group mental models which represent potential conflicts of interest and barriers for collaborative governance. Fish farmer models emphasize resource system challenges relating to production instability and risk, while government managers emphasize increasing production intensity to meet sectoral growth targets. Researchers, in contrast, tend to focus on pond waste treatment and water quality management. Governance attributes were consistently perceived as less frequent and less influential compared to other social–ecological dimensions, reflecting perceptions of weak governance in the sector. We identify a critical need for programs aimed at strengthening community-level institutional arrangements for governing shared aquaculture resources, increasing technical knowledge capacity, and managing financial risk. By merging all stakeholder models into a single “community” model, we identify key consensus action situations across the three groups as potential focal points for aquaculture development which may serve as a starting point for actors to work together to identify context-appropriate institutional solutions to these sustainability challenges.