Organizing coordination in a public marine research and management advice organization: The case of the Norwegian Institute of Marine Research

Public organizations involved in marine management are increasingly confronted with coordination challenges in marine governance. This study examines why and how the Norwegian Institute of Marine Research (IMR) reorganized its formal coordination structures between the areas of fisheries management and marine environmental management. The findings indicate that organizing efficient and, at the same time, legitimate coordination structures between different areas of marine governance is a “wicked” organizational problem with no ultimate and single optimal solution. In contrast to the assumptions of classical organization and management theory, the study finds that the reorganization of formal coordination structures is not necessarily driven for reasons of efficiency and perceived coordination problems. Instead, public marine management organizations also change their organizational structures to live up to external expectations to adopt modern management concepts, such as the Ecosystem Approach to Management (EAM). However, the study indicates that the adoption of the EAM has stimulated coordination and integration efforts in the research and advisory activities of the IMR.