Christina C Hicks
Biographic Data
| ID | 159209 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Christina C Hicks |
| GIVEN NAMES | Christina C |
| FAMILY NAME | Hicks |
| SIGNATURE | HICKS C C |
| AFFILIATIONS | Lancaster University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-7399-4603 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 41 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 134 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 41 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2009 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 8 |
Beyond growth? Understanding the grassroots entrepreneurship of women fish processors in Ghana
Unveiling pervasive assumptions: Moving beyond the poverty-biodiversity loss association in conservation
This paper reflects on the continued persistence of the idea in conservation research and practice that poverty drives biodiversity loss (the poverty-biodiversity loss association [PBLA]). We draw on evidence to show how the PBLA has proven resistant to counter-evidence and is particularly visible at local-level implementation, and is often implicit in conservation strategies. We untangle three underlying reasons that help to explain why the PBLA…
Food, power and agency: Revealing local post-harvest fisheries practices to improve food access from small-scale fisheries in coastal Kenya
This article proposes the case of Kenyan coastal fisheries as a potentially crucial reservoir of food-related benefits for the marginalised and those living in poverty, but where a food-centred lens or approach is seldom mainstreamed in local and national governance. Borrowing insights from post-structuralist marine social sciences, this article presents an ethnographic account of grassroots practices in-the-making such as handling, sorting, and …
Citizen voice and state response in the context of food system transformations
This paper reviews the dynamic interplay between food activism and state responses, focusing on the diverse ways and strategies used by food movements to advocate for food systems transformation. More so, in a context of growing corporate control in food systems, food activism has been promoting just and sustainable alternatives. State reactions have been evolving, ranging from repression to policy change, to, in some cases, collaboration. Throug…
Corporate concentration and power matter for agency in food systems
High levels of corporate concentration and power in agrifood supply chains raise important policy concerns because they can affect food systems in adverse ways. In this paper, we argue that increased corporate concentration and power in food systems has the capacity to undermine people’s agency– that is, their capability to make choices and exercise their voice. We explore three dimensions of the relationship between concentrated corporate power …
Fish markets facilitate nutrition security in coastal Kenya: Empirical evidence for policy leveraging
Fish markets are key to supporting the availability and accessibility of nutritious food but are often overlooked in food and nutrition research and policy. This study investigated fish markets in coastal Kenya, using data from 223 semi-structured interviews collected through market surveys, and analyzed their potential to meet recommendations for consumption and alleviate malnutrition in a vulnerable coastal population (children under five years…
Drivers of nutrient intakes from fisheries in French Polynesia
Small-scale fisheries provide nutrients to hundreds of millions of people worldwide, with yields dependent on the condition of marine habitats such as coral reefs. Small-scale fisheries are a particularly important food source in societies with nutrient deficiencies and where unhealthy food alternatives are widely available. Using data from coral reef surveys around two islands in French Polynesia (Moorea and Raiatea), we show how the availabilit…
The distribution of environmental pressures from global dietary shift
The production and consumption of food is one of the main drivers of environmental change globally. Meanwhile, many populations remain malnourished due to insufficient or unhealthy diets. Increasingly, dietary shifts are proposed as a means to address both environmental and health concerns. We have a limited understanding of how dietary shifts could alter where food is produced and consumed and how these changes would affect the distribution of e…
Principles for transformative ocean governance
With a focus on oceans, we collaborated across ecological, social and legal disciplines to respond to the United Nations call for transformation in the ‘2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development’. We developed a set of 13 principles that strategically and critically connect transformative ocean research to transformative ocean governance (complementing the UN Decade for Ocean Science). We used a rigorous, iterative and transparent consensus-buildin…
Status, challenges and pathways to the sustainable use of wild species
Advancing research on ecosystem service bundles for comparative assessments and synthesis
Social-ecological interactions have been shown to generate interrelated and reoccurring sets of ecosystem services, also known as ecosystem service bundles. Given the potential utility of the bundles concept, along with the recent surge in interest it is timely to reflect on the concept, its current use and potential for the future. Based on our ecosystem service bundle experience, expertise, and ecosystem service bundle analyses, we have found c…
Climate-induced increases in micronutrient availability for coral reef fisheries
Climate change is transforming coral reefs, threatening supply of essential dietary micronutrients from small-scale fisheries to tropical coastal communities. Yet the nutritional value of reef fisheries and climate impacts on micronutrient availability remain unclear, hindering efforts to sustain food and nutrition security. Here, we measure nutrient content in coral reef fishes in Seychelles and show that reef fish are important sources of selen…
The blue economy as a boundary object for hegemony across scales
The blue economy has become an influential concept in international and national marine governance discourse. Various contested interpretations exist, and different actors choose to emphasise different aspects of the triple goal of environmental, economic, and social improvements. However, despite disagreement over its interpretations, the blue economy finds support in many different arenas. This paper explores the position of dominance that the …
Fishers perceptions of ecosystem service change associated with climate‐disturbed coral reefs
Understanding ecosystem service change necessitates an understanding of the social and ecological dimensions of ecosystem services and how they contribute to the well‐being of different people. These empirical research gaps persist across the tropics and in coastal environments, posing a challenge for small island states that depend on ecosystem services associated with near‐shore ecosystems like coral reefs. Perception‐based approaches allow for…
Secure local aquatic food systems in the face of declining coral reefs
Reconciling well-being and resilience for sustainable development
Disentangling ecosystem services preferences and values
Preferences for ecosystem services provide information on what people find important in their human-nature relationships, which can enhance environmental governance. However, preferences are ‘reason-blind’, obscuring the underlying values that shape them. Increasingly, values – concepts or beliefs about desirable end states or behaviours that transcend specific situations and guide behaviour – receive attention in environmental governance, but la…
Recognize fish as food in policy discourse and development funding
The international development community is off-track from meeting targets for alleviating global malnutrition. Meanwhile, there is growing consensus across scientific disciplines that fish plays a crucial role in food and nutrition security. However, this ‘fish as food’ perspective has yet to translate into policy and development funding priorities. We argue that the traditional framing of fish as a natural resource emphasizes economic developmen…
Changing the narrative on fisheries subsidies reform: Enabling transitions to achieve SDG 14.6 and beyond
The World Trade Organization (WTO) is in the final stages of negotiating an agreement to prohibit harmful fisheries subsidies, thereby achieving UN Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 14.6. An effective agreement should be viewed as an opportunity for nations to proactively transition towards sustainable and equitable fisheries and pave the path for other SDGs. Supporting fishers does not require harmful subsidies, and we provide evidence-based op…
Not Just Participation: The Rise of the Eco‐Precariat in the Green Economy
Despite recent attention to “frontier” green economies and the governance of emerging ecosystem services, the specific division of labour in these economies has been little studied. As many such initiatives are in the global South, labour’s marginality potentially contributes to the existing precariousness of those who are more often identified as “participants”. This article examines the roles and vulnerabilities of these actors: the carbon coun…
Harnessing global fisheries to tackle micronutrient deficiencies
Securing a Just Space for Small-Scale Fisheries in the Blue Economy
The vast development opportunities offered by the world’s coasts and oceans have attracted the attention of governments, private enterprises, philanthropic organizations and international conservation organizations. High-profile dialogue and policy decisions on ocean futures are informed largely by economic and ecological research. Key insights from the social sciences raise concerns for food and nutrition security, livelihoods and social justice…
The Gendered Nature of Ecosystem Services
This article assesses the extent to which our conceptualisation, understanding and empirical analysis of ecosystem services are inherently gendered; in other words, how they might be biased and unbalanced in terms of their appreciation of gender differences. We do this by empirically investigating how women and men are able to benefit from ecosystem services across eight communities in coastal Kenya and Mozambique. Our results highlight different…
Access to marine ecosystem services: Examining entanglement and legitimacy in customary institutions
Networking the Blue Economy in Seychelles: Pioneers, Resistance, and the Power of Influence
The Blue Economy has gained traction as a key concept that seeks to stem biodiversity loss whilst stimulating economic development, thereby integrating environmental and economic interests. Although the Blue Economy builds on the more familiar Green Economy, academic critique is still emerging and can be slow to translate into changes in policy and practice. What the Blue Economy means to national and local policy makers and practioners is seldom…
Conceptualizing and operationalizing human wellbeing for ecosystem assessment and management
Evaluating the best available social science for natural resource management decision-making
Responding to change: Using scenarios to understand how socioeconomic factors may influence amplifying or dampening exploitation feedbacks among Tanzanian fishers
Corporate concentration and power matter for agency in food systems
High levels of corporate concentration and power in agrifood supply chains raise important policy concerns because they can affect food systems in adverse ways. In this paper, we argue that increased corporate concentration and power in food systems has the capacity to undermine people’s agency– that is, their capability to make choices and exercise their voice. We explore three dimensions of the relationship between concentrated corporate power …
Reconciling well-being and resilience for sustainable development
Synergies and tradeoffs in how managers, scientists, and fishers value coral reef ecosystem services
Not Just Participation: The Rise of the Eco‐Precariat in the Green Economy
Despite recent attention to “frontier” green economies and the governance of emerging ecosystem services, the specific division of labour in these economies has been little studied. As many such initiatives are in the global South, labour’s marginality potentially contributes to the existing precariousness of those who are more often identified as “participants”. This article examines the roles and vulnerabilities of these actors: the carbon coun…
Elasticity in ecosystem services: Exploring the Variable Relationship Between Ecosystems and Human Well-Being
Daw, T. M., C. Hicks, K. Brown, T. Chaigneau, F. Januchowski-Hartley, W. Cheung, S. Rosendo, B. Crona, S. Coulthard, C. Sandbrook, C. Perry, S. Bandeira, N. A. Muthiga, B. Schulte-Herbrüggen, J. Bosire, and T. R. McClanahan. 2016. Elasticity in ecosystem services: exploring the variable relationship between ecosystems and human well-being. Ecology and Society 21(2):11.http://dx.doi.org/10.5751/ES-08173-210211
Future Scenarios as a Research Tool: Investigating Climate Change Impacts, Adaptation Options and Outcomes for the Great Barrier Reef, Australia
Rethinking environmental leadership: The social construction of leaders and leadership in discourses of ecological crisis, development, and conservation
Leadership is heralded as being critical to addressing the “crisis of governance” facing the Earth's natural systems. While political, economic, and corporate discourses of leadership have been widely and critically interrogated, narratives of environmental leadership remain relatively neglected in the academic literature. The aims of this paper are twofold. First, to highlight the centrality and importance of environmental science's construction…
Access to marine ecosystem services: Examining entanglement and legitimacy in customary institutions
Understanding leadership in the environmental sciences
Evans, L. S., C. C. Hicks, P. J. Cohen, P. Case, M. Prideaux, and D. J. Mills. 2015. Understanding leadership in the environmental sciences. Ecology and Society 20(1): 50. https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-07268-200150
Citizen voice and state response in the context of food system transformations
This paper reviews the dynamic interplay between food activism and state responses, focusing on the diverse ways and strategies used by food movements to advocate for food systems transformation. More so, in a context of growing corporate control in food systems, food activism has been promoting just and sustainable alternatives. State reactions have been evolving, ranging from repression to policy change, to, in some cases, collaboration. Throug…
Securing the blue: Political ecologies of the blue economy in Africa
The Blue Economy concept is being embraced enthusiastically in Africa, both internally and externally. However, this new framing creates and calls for new understandings of how actors and places relate to one another, control, and create meaning and value. Thus, understanding the ocean - and its conceptual and material fabric - in this context, is a matter of political ecology, raising a number of questions that extend across geographies, spatio-…
Trade-Offs in Values Assigned to Ecological Goods and Services Associated with Different Coral Reef Management Strategies
Hicks, C. C., T. R. McClanahan, J. E. Cinner, and J. M. Hills. 2009. Trade-offs in values assigned to ecological goods and services associated with different coral reef management strategies. Ecology and Society 14(1): 10. https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-02712-140110
Principles for transformative ocean governance
With a focus on oceans, we collaborated across ecological, social and legal disciplines to respond to the United Nations call for transformation in the ‘2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development’. We developed a set of 13 principles that strategically and critically connect transformative ocean research to transformative ocean governance (complementing the UN Decade for Ocean Science). We used a rigorous, iterative and transparent consensus-buildin…
Status, challenges and pathways to the sustainable use of wild species
Disentangling ecosystem services preferences and values
Preferences for ecosystem services provide information on what people find important in their human-nature relationships, which can enhance environmental governance. However, preferences are ‘reason-blind’, obscuring the underlying values that shape them. Increasingly, values – concepts or beliefs about desirable end states or behaviours that transcend specific situations and guide behaviour – receive attention in environmental governance, but la…
Recognize fish as food in policy discourse and development funding
The international development community is off-track from meeting targets for alleviating global malnutrition. Meanwhile, there is growing consensus across scientific disciplines that fish plays a crucial role in food and nutrition security. However, this ‘fish as food’ perspective has yet to translate into policy and development funding priorities. We argue that the traditional framing of fish as a natural resource emphasizes economic developmen…
Networking the Blue Economy in Seychelles: Pioneers, Resistance, and the Power of Influence
The Blue Economy has gained traction as a key concept that seeks to stem biodiversity loss whilst stimulating economic development, thereby integrating environmental and economic interests. Although the Blue Economy builds on the more familiar Green Economy, academic critique is still emerging and can be slow to translate into changes in policy and practice. What the Blue Economy means to national and local policy makers and practioners is seldom…
Fishery benefits and stakeholder priorities associated with a coral reef fishery and their implications for management
Trade-Offs in Values Assigned to Ecological Goods and Services Associated with Different Coral Reef Management Strategies
Hicks, C. C., T. R. McClanahan, J. E. Cinner, and J. M. Hills. 2009. Trade-offs in values assigned to ecological goods and services associated with different coral reef management strategies. Ecology and Society 14(1): 10. https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-02712-140110
Responding to change: Using scenarios to understand how socioeconomic factors may influence amplifying or dampening exploitation feedbacks among Tanzanian fishers
A social–ecological approach to conservation planning: Embedding social considerations
Many conservation plans remain unimplemented, in part because of insufficient consideration of the social processes that influence conservation decisions. Complementing social considerations with an integrated understanding of the ecology of a region can result in a more complete conservation approach. We suggest that linking conservation planning to a social–ecological systems (SES) framework can lead to a more thorough understanding of human–en…
Synergies and tradeoffs in how managers, scientists, and fishers value coral reef ecosystem services
Future Scenarios as a Research Tool: Investigating Climate Change Impacts, Adaptation Options and Outcomes for the Great Barrier Reef, Australia
Fishery benefits and stakeholder priorities associated with a coral reef fishery and their implications for management
Rethinking environmental leadership: The social construction of leaders and leadership in discourses of ecological crisis, development, and conservation
Leadership is heralded as being critical to addressing the “crisis of governance” facing the Earth's natural systems. While political, economic, and corporate discourses of leadership have been widely and critically interrogated, narratives of environmental leadership remain relatively neglected in the academic literature. The aims of this paper are twofold. First, to highlight the centrality and importance of environmental science's construction…
Understanding leadership in the environmental sciences
Evans, L. S., C. C. Hicks, P. J. Cohen, P. Case, M. Prideaux, and D. J. Mills. 2015. Understanding leadership in the environmental sciences. Ecology and Society 20(1): 50. https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-07268-200150
Engage key social concepts for sustainability
Social indicators, both mature and emerging, are underused
Conceptualizing and operationalizing human wellbeing for ecosystem assessment and management
Elasticity in ecosystem services: Exploring the Variable Relationship Between Ecosystems and Human Well-Being
Daw, T. M., C. Hicks, K. Brown, T. Chaigneau, F. Januchowski-Hartley, W. Cheung, S. Rosendo, B. Crona, S. Coulthard, C. Sandbrook, C. Perry, S. Bandeira, N. A. Muthiga, B. Schulte-Herbrüggen, J. Bosire, and T. R. McClanahan. 2016. Elasticity in ecosystem services: exploring the variable relationship between ecosystems and human well-being. Ecology and Society 21(2):11.http://dx.doi.org/10.5751/ES-08173-210211
The Landscape of Leadership in Environmental Governance: A Case Study from Solomon Islands
Evaluating the best available social science for natural resource management decision-making
Building adaptive capacity to climate change in tropical coastal communities
The Crowding Out of Complex Social Goods
Harnessing global fisheries to tackle micronutrient deficiencies
Securing a Just Space for Small-Scale Fisheries in the Blue Economy
The vast development opportunities offered by the world’s coasts and oceans have attracted the attention of governments, private enterprises, philanthropic organizations and international conservation organizations. High-profile dialogue and policy decisions on ocean futures are informed largely by economic and ecological research. Key insights from the social sciences raise concerns for food and nutrition security, livelihoods and social justice…
The Gendered Nature of Ecosystem Services
This article assesses the extent to which our conceptualisation, understanding and empirical analysis of ecosystem services are inherently gendered; in other words, how they might be biased and unbalanced in terms of their appreciation of gender differences. We do this by empirically investigating how women and men are able to benefit from ecosystem services across eight communities in coastal Kenya and Mozambique. Our results highlight different…
Access to marine ecosystem services: Examining entanglement and legitimacy in customary institutions
Networking the Blue Economy in Seychelles: Pioneers, Resistance, and the Power of Influence
The Blue Economy has gained traction as a key concept that seeks to stem biodiversity loss whilst stimulating economic development, thereby integrating environmental and economic interests. Although the Blue Economy builds on the more familiar Green Economy, academic critique is still emerging and can be slow to translate into changes in policy and practice. What the Blue Economy means to national and local policy makers and practioners is seldom…
Securing the blue: Political ecologies of the blue economy in Africa
The Blue Economy concept is being embraced enthusiastically in Africa, both internally and externally. However, this new framing creates and calls for new understandings of how actors and places relate to one another, control, and create meaning and value. Thus, understanding the ocean - and its conceptual and material fabric - in this context, is a matter of political ecology, raising a number of questions that extend across geographies, spatio-…
Changing the narrative on fisheries subsidies reform: Enabling transitions to achieve SDG 14.6 and beyond
The World Trade Organization (WTO) is in the final stages of negotiating an agreement to prohibit harmful fisheries subsidies, thereby achieving UN Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 14.6. An effective agreement should be viewed as an opportunity for nations to proactively transition towards sustainable and equitable fisheries and pave the path for other SDGs. Supporting fishers does not require harmful subsidies, and we provide evidence-based op…
Not Just Participation: The Rise of the Eco‐Precariat in the Green Economy
Despite recent attention to “frontier” green economies and the governance of emerging ecosystem services, the specific division of labour in these economies has been little studied. As many such initiatives are in the global South, labour’s marginality potentially contributes to the existing precariousness of those who are more often identified as “participants”. This article examines the roles and vulnerabilities of these actors: the carbon coun…
The blue economy as a boundary object for hegemony across scales
The blue economy has become an influential concept in international and national marine governance discourse. Various contested interpretations exist, and different actors choose to emphasise different aspects of the triple goal of environmental, economic, and social improvements. However, despite disagreement over its interpretations, the blue economy finds support in many different arenas. This paper explores the position of dominance that the …
Fishers perceptions of ecosystem service change associated with climate‐disturbed coral reefs
Understanding ecosystem service change necessitates an understanding of the social and ecological dimensions of ecosystem services and how they contribute to the well‐being of different people. These empirical research gaps persist across the tropics and in coastal environments, posing a challenge for small island states that depend on ecosystem services associated with near‐shore ecosystems like coral reefs. Perception‐based approaches allow for…
Economics (27 works) · Ecology (25 works) · Business (20 works) · Environmental resource management (20 works) · Geography (20 works) · Biology (19 works) · Political science (19 works) · Coral and Marine Ecosystems Studies (15 works) · Sociology (15 works) · Fishery (13 works)