Sustainability Science (2020) 15:63–73 https://doi.org/10.1007/s11625-019-00770-0 SPECIAL FEATURE: ORIGINAL ARTICLE Blue Degrowth and the Politics of the Sea: Rethinking the Blue Economy Swimming upstream: community economies for a diferent coastal rural development in Sweden Milena Arias Schreiber1 · Ida Wingren2 · Sebastian Linke1 Received: 7 April 2019 / Accepted: 4 December 2019 / Published online: 23 December 2019 © The Author(s) 2019 Abstract The EU Blue Growth agenda is being implemented at a time when European coastal fsheries and traditional fshing com- munities are struggling to survive or have already vanished from areas where they used to fourish. Driven by the strong conviction that current disadvantaged and vulnerable coastal fshers still have a central role to play in rural development, local level initiatives are calling for a diferent future for this fshery sector. The participants in these initiatives insist that coastal fsheries should not be driven to extinction, despite their low economic proftability and thus minimal contribution to economic growth compared to large-scale enterprises. Through participatory observation and informal interviews, we investigate one of these local level initiatives on the Swedish Baltic Sea coast and analyse how it aligns with a community economies’ project based on a diferent economic perspective. We describe frst the primary activities carried out by the initiative and follow by an examination on what drove it, how it has been maintained, and how it might spread. We conclude on the potentials of the community economies framework and project to advance a Blue degrowth agenda based on difer- ence and not necessarily less. Keywords Coastal small-scale fsheries · Degrowth · Community economies · Diverse economies · Baltic Sea · Grassroots initiative Introduction persevering European Union’s top-down policy-setting (Eli- asen et al. 2015), of which the Blue Growth Agenda is a case The sustainability of European fsheries has been increas- in point. The second, as Jentoft (2019) argues, is the bulk of ingly discussed since the adoption of the European Union’s evidence showing that ocean policies can exacerbate social Blue Growth agenda in 2012 (EC 2012). Questions about inequalities and ecological deterioration, if they focus solely whether and how economic growth and sustainability can on economic growth and disregard distributional efects. be achieved simultaneously in a resource-limited ocean have Both concerns are relevant for current users of European sparked new debates about demands for growth or degrowth seas, including coastal and industrial fshers who stand to (Eikeset et al. 2018; Hadjimichael 2018). In fsheries, two proft or lose out from a policy that depicts the oceans as the further areas of concern related to this growth/degrowth new frontier for sustainable economic development. agenda are pertinent. The frst deals with the efcacy of the The Blue Growth agenda is being implemented at a time when EU small-scale fsheries1 and traditional coastal fsh- ing communities are struggling to survive or have already Handled by Osamu Saito, Institute of Sustainability and Peace, Japan. vanished from areas where they used to fourish (Arias Schreiber et al. 2018; Lloret et al. 2018). In the recent past, * Milena Arias Schreiber if not today, such fsheries provided high-quality seafood [email protected] and local employment, and drove economic and social life in 1 School of Global Studies, University of Gothenburg, many rural areas (e.g., Menzies 2011; Snyder and St. Martin Gothenburg, Sweden 2015). Yet over recent decades, EU coastal fsheries have 2 Department of Service Management and Service Studies, 1 We use small-scale fsheries and coastal fsheries as synonyms Lund University, Lund, Sweden throughout the remainder of the text. Vol.:(0123456789)1 3 64 Sustainability Science (2020) 15:63–73 been neglected and marginalized relative to demands from profitability and insignificant contribution to Swedish large-scale commercial fsheries and pro-environmental national economy in comparison to large-scale industrial organizations (Arias Schreiber et al. 2017; Said et al. 2016; fsheries (see STECF 2018). In other words, participants in Høst 2015; Ertör-Akyazı, this issue; Said and MacMillan, the Simrishamn initiative oppose the cornucopian approach3 this issue). Moreover, an ongoing and in cases irreversible of the Blue Growth strategy, and propose an agenda that degradation of European marine ecosystems, the results of focuses on the contradiction between sustainability and end- overfshing, and more recently climate change, have also less economic growth as emphasized by the Blue degrowth been negatively impacting on coastal fshers and their com- paradigm (Hadjimichael 2018). Thus, the initiative aims at munities (Lloret et al. 2018; Gascuel et al. 2016). Coastal a more equitable system for limiting the access to fshing fshing communities are, therefore, well known to be vulner- resources—one that does not favour this access to the most able and disadvantaged, in Europe and elsewhere (Jentoft economically efcient—and a reduction in fsheries land- 2019; Said and MacMillan, this issue). ings that will simultaneously foster the wellbeing of coastal The Swedish welfare state is no exception and most communities and respect for the marine environment. Their coastal fshers have been pushed out of their traditional activities to achieve these goals can be considered as local occupations, largely as a consequence of reduced fsh stocks eforts towards a project for sustainable degrowth defned and unfavourable top-down fshing policies (Arias Schreiber in one of its classical versions as “an equitable downscaling et al. 2018, 2017). At both international (EU) and national of production and consumption that increases human well- (Sweden) levels, policies have consistently favoured the being and enhances ecological conditions at the local and employment of neoliberal-oriented fsheries’ management global level, in the short and long term” (Schneider et al. tools. The stated aim of these tools is to maintain fsh stocks 2010). Thus, this local initiative claims for a deep transfor- at healthy levels2 while maximizing profts and economic mation where the focus is on “diference and not only less” efciency, with the latter being a direct proxy for human (Kallis et al. 2014, 33) including diferent ways to decide welfare (see e.g. Prellezo et al. 2012; Symes and Phillip- which fsheries sectors ought to be developed and to pursue son 2009). However, these policies primarily beneft large, “diferent relations with the non-human world” (Kallis et al. mobile fsheries that rely on economies of scale to achieve 2014, 4). proftability. They bring no benefts to near-shore coastal As in claims for a degrowth society where everything fshers who lack fnancial capital, and for whom large invest- is diferent (Kallis et al. 2014), a claim of diference aligns ments are either too risky or simply beyond their reach (Høst with theoretical concepts that emphasize the transforma- 2015; Boonstra and Hentati-Sundberg 2016). Consequently, tive potential of challenging the hegemonic framing of the the majority of small-scale Swedish fshers have already economy as singularly capitalist. The term diverse econo- vanished from the coastline (Krogseng 2016; Björvick 2013) mies (Gibson-Graham 2008) was coined and developed to and those remaining are struggling to survive the neoliberal embrace the vast number of diferent types of economic regime of commodifcation and privatization of the ocean’s transactions, labour products, property, fnancial practices commons (Arias Schreiber et al. 2018). and enterprises that are not captured by a singular capital- This article draws on the concepts of diverse economies ist economy but, taken together, probably account for more and community economies to analyse a Swedish municipal assign value and almost certainly more of living well4 than initiative that attempts to prevent the imminent disappear- mainstream capitalocentric economic activities (ibid.; Gib- ance of coastal fsheries because of their low potential for son-Graham et al. 2013). Examples of diverse economic economic growth in the face of the EU Blue Growth agenda, practices are unpaid age and health care (with an estimated the Swedish neoliberal-oriented fsheries policies and the annual monetary value in the USA of US $200 billion), soli- deteriorated status of the Baltic Sea ecosystem. The initiative darity cooperatives, voluntary work for non-proft organi- is driven by the strong conviction that coastal fshing still zations, charity shops, or loans among family members has a central role to play in rural development and that its (Gibson-Graham et al. 2013). More recent examples are current disadvantaged and vulnerable status can and should the hundreds of Community Supported Agriculture initia- be reversed. In an enterprise in line with a Blue degrowth tives—and lately also Community Supported Fisheries ini- perspective, the initiative’s activities are directed to ensure a tiatives—that have proliferated worldwide especially since future for the coastal fshing sector, despite its low economic the 2000s, which promote partnerships between farmers 3 Cornucopian is used to describe the bold assumption that techno- 2 These “healthy levels” are inscribed in the EU’s Common Fishery logical innovation and scientifc knowledge and its application will Policy management objective of Maximum Sustainable Yield (MSY). guarantee the