This chapter interrogates the political and ecological implications of digital transformations in ocean governance through a case study of on-bird fisheries surveillance using albatrosses. We bring together digital and more-than-human geographies, political ecology, and science and technology studies to critically assess an emerging model of ocean governance exemplified through this case. Our account is attentive to the lively agencies of technologies, animals, and oceanic volumes, as well as to the power structures governing these more-than-human assemblages. We first outline a new wet ontology of the ocean and its attendant modes of governance. Second, we consider the risks presented by these governance approaches to the animals they enrol. Lastly, we interrogate how these approaches naturalise surveillance as a solution to marine ecological issues. In conclusion, we reflect on the potential for digital ecologies research to address these new data-driven and animal-borne approaches to marine science and governance, and to offer cross-disciplinary understandings of these novel forms of governance as they emerge.
Part of ISBN 9781526170347
QC 20241230