Option B • Section 4
Ocean Management Futures
Resource extraction, pollution, strategic routes and the challenge of managing oceans as a global commons.
Future possibilities for managing the oceans as a global commons
The ocean resource frontier
Offshore hydrocarbons, marine minerals and new technologies expand extraction into deeper water.
Assess demand, technological feasibility, environmental risk and governance. The Clarion–Clipperton Zone illustrates competing claims about critical minerals, uncertainty and irreversible ecosystem loss.
Decision conference
Represent a mining company, Pacific state, marine scientist, environmental NGO, technology manufacturer and future generation. Decide whether the CCZ should face a moratorium, precautionary trials or regulated extraction.
Fisheries and the global commons
Industrial capacity, subsidies, illegal fishing and weak governance can push stocks beyond sustainable limits.
Use the tragedy of the commons carefully: fish are mobile, access is unequal and governance is not absent everywhere. Compare open-access problems with quotas, marine protected areas, co-management and ecosystem-based fisheries.
Fisheries-management audit
For one fishery, map the stock, fleets, market, governing institutions and affected communities. Evaluate whether management addresses biological limits, livelihoods and enforcement together.
Managing ocean pollution
Plastic, nutrients, sewage, oil and toxic waste enter oceans through different pathways and require different responses.
Source-to-sea strategy
Choose one pollutant. Trace source, pathway, accumulation zone, impacts and stakeholders. Rank prevention, regulation, redesign, collection and clean-up by effectiveness and scale.
Maritime chokepoints
Narrow sea routes concentrate global trade, energy flows, infrastructure and geopolitical risk.
Study Hormuz, Malacca, Suez, Panama and Bab el-Mandeb. Evaluate strategic importance through trade volume, alternatives, commodities, naval power and consequences of disruption.
Five-chokepoint comparison
For each route, record location, users, key flows, disruption risks and alternatives. Rank global significance, then test how the ranking changes for energy, food or container trade.
South China Sea
Overlapping claims, resources, fisheries, strategic routes and artificial islands create a complex regional dispute.
Claim–evidence–power map
Map claimant states, nine-dash line, EEZs, islands and major routes. For each actor, distinguish legal claims, strategic interests and actions. Evaluate the role and limits of UNCLOS.
Managing a global commons
Future ocean governance must reconcile national rights, global interests, science, uncertainty and justice.
Ocean futures summit
Allocate investment across fisheries, pollution, shipping, deep-sea mining and marine protection. Justify priorities by ecological effectiveness, equity, enforceability and international cooperation, then answer: To what extent can the oceans be managed effectively as a global commons?