About

Dr Sarah Lawless is a marine social scientist and Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Ocean Governance. Sarah’s research is supported under the AIMS@JCU program, a strategic partnership between JCU and the Australian Institute of Marine Science. Sarah is the first social scientist engaged under this program, where she contributes to a key research area of common interest - improving governance of changing oceans. Broadly, Sarah’s research is concerned with addressing the dual challenge of ensuring social equity and ecological sustainability in the governance of marine social-ecological systems. Sarah looks critically at how marine science, policies and interventions seek to improve fisheries, food systems and coastal environments, and the implications these may have human development outcomes. Her publications in journals including Global Environmental Change, Nature Climate Changeand Marine Policy illustrate the tendency for marine governance and associated interventions to prioritise ecological goals without attention to social impacts, including inadequate integration of local perspectives and needs. Sarah’s empirical research in the Pacific Islands region finds that even when commitments to addressing social inequities are made in policy and practice, approaches often misdiagnose the underlying drivers of inequity resulting in instrumental and symptomatic responses

Sarah’s research adds weight to growing calls to improve the way human dimensions are considered and integrated within marine governance, policy and practice. Specifically, her research emphasises how social equity, human rights and justice are foundations to sustainable social-ecological systems, and provides guidance for policies, practices and research to more deeply consider and address such issues. Sarah’s research contributions include insights for small-scale fisheries and climate policies and practices to ensure equitable outcomes for local communities.

 As an applied qualitative social scientist, Sarah has used and developed novel methodologies to look critically at the marine policies and practices within multi-scale marine governance arrangements. Much of her empirical research has been conducted in tropical marine social-ecological systems in the Pacific Islands region, including Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea, Fiji and Vanuatu. This research has been published in journals including Nature Climate Change, Global Environmental Change, World Development, Ambio and Earth System Governance.

 Sarah has spent the past decade working as an expert consultant to a range of non-governmental organizations, research institutions and universities working on equitable social-ecological systems research, policy and practice. Some of these organisations include the Nature Conservancy, WorldFish, the World Wide Fund for Nature and CARE International. Sarah works closely with a network of social scientists and development practitioners to ensure her research is grounded in the realities of coastal communities. Sarah’s commitment to applied research means much of her research has been conducted in partnership with organisations seeking to enact social change. These results are therefore relayed in useable formats for policymakers and practitioners, including practically relevant guidance, frameworks and communication materials.

Sarah is a member of the Governing Ocean Change research program and SNAPP group. Here, Sarah joins an interdisciplinary team of scientist, government and non-government experts working toward governance transitions fit for novel and rapidly emerging interventions in climate-impacted oceans.

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The map shows research collaborations by institution from the past 7 years.
Note: Map points are indicative of the countries or states that institutions are associated with.

  • 5+ collaborations
  • 4 collaborations
  • 3 collaborations
  • 2 collaborations
  • 1 collaboration
  • Indicates the Tropics (Torrid Zone)

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