Surfacing Imaginaries of the Ocean: A Critical Look Into the Ocean Decade for Sustainable Development, 2021-2030

Abstract

The ways in which people have been debating and writing about ‘development’ have, over the past few decades, experienced significant shifts. This thesis is primarily concerned with just that: what people may perceive when they either hear, speak, or write development, what development organizations try to achieve when they launch development programmes on a global scale, what development practitioners may imagine what they are doing when planning and working on development projects – and the implications of these on relations of power between the Global North and Global South. Surfacing imaginaries of the ocean does this by exploring the broad historical context within which the United Nations Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development emerged. It does this by tracing the origins of the development discourses regarding ocean spaces and noting the continuities and disruptions that led to the establishment of the latest discourses of development and its accompanying industry. Rafa Itchon is an MA student of the Development Studies Programme at the University of Auckland, Aotearoa New Zealand. This follows an early career in fiscal and monetary policy and governance working in the national government of the Philippines and around Asia. Rafa’s work has encompassed public debt and liabilities management, financial market development, financial data analytics, internal revenue operations, pegovian taxes and various customs processes including anti-smuggling and post-entry audit, among others.