Scientized territoriality over the ocean: Data production, resource distribution, and the political ecology of the high seas fishery

This article reconceptualizes ocean governance on the high seas through the analytic lens of “scientized territoriality,” highlighting how fisheries science mediates both data production and the extension of state power within international regulatory regimes. Focusing on the North Pacific Fisheries Commission (NPFC) and the management of Pacific saury, the study reveals that scientific knowledge—produced under persistent ecological uncertainty—serves not simply as neutral evidence, but as a political tool in the negotiation and implementation of resource management measures. Fieldwork, archival analysis, and interviews demonstrate that Japan, Taiwan, and China leverage scientific ambiguity both to defend national interests and to enable international collaboration. The key argument advanced is that direct state control is not transferred to the high seas in a classic territorial way. Instead, state authority becomes “nested” within the broader institutional framework of Regional Fisheries Management Organizations (RFMOs), with fisheries scientists and scientific data production providing the legitimate means for states to perform and negotiate their influence. This nested state power is operationalized through the continual co-production of scientific assessments, legal agreements, and diplomatic compromise, transforming the high seas from unregulated frontiers to managed territories. Ultimately, the paper contends that ocean governance is best understood as a dynamic process in which authority, legitimacy, and jurisdiction are continually reconfigured through the interplay of national interests, scientific knowledge, and collaborative international regimes—making jurisdiction on the high seas a negotiated, nested, and evolving outcome rather than a matter of static sovereignty or direct enclosure.