Fisheries area-based partnerships in European multilevel governance: understanding embeddedness in organisational environments

Abstract

In the neo-endogenous development paradigm promoted by the European Union (EU), which seeks to reconcile local and supralocal objectives, local actors are expected to be meaningfully integrated within broader multilevel governance (MLG) structures, a condition often referred to as embeddedness in organisational environments. This article investigates three types of embeddedness of Fisheries Local Action Groups in Poland (FLAGs—area-based cross-sectoral partnerships operating in fisheries, aquaculture and related domains) within local and external organisational environments: institutional, structural and relational. We compare the results of A) content analysis of legal administrative documents about FLAGs (reflecting institutional embeddedness), B) the webometric analysis of hyperlinks to local and external organisations from the websites of FLAGs (reflecting structural embeddedness), with C) findings from semi-structured interviews conducted with FLAG representatives on direct relations with local and external stakeholders (reflecting relational embeddedness). The highest share of FLAGs linked to central government bodies, followed by local governments. Interviewees most frequently identified regional and local authorities, followed by local farmers and entrepreneurs as their main institutional contacts. This discrepancy may reflect the differentiated functions of open and direct communication channels. The links to EU institutions and foreign LAGs were the weakest. The observed pattern of ties indicates that while FLAGs exhibit a degree of local and external embeddedness, typical for MLG, their primary orientation in many cases appears to be securing EU funding rather than engaging in deliberative processes concerning sustainable fisheries policy. These characteristics of embeddedness allow two types of FLAGs to be identified: transformative pro-development and narrow grant-orientated.