Marysia Szymkowiak

Marysia has over a decade of experience conducting research on the human dimensions of Alaska’s fisheries. Her work focuses on how people derive value from and make choices about fisheries participation, and how climate change, management, market, and sociocultural issues are affecting fishermen and fishing communities. 

Marysia applies mixed-methods approaches including participatory methods to ensure stakeholder engagement in the development of science and policy in the North Pacific. Her current work focuses on developing climate adaptation plans for Gulf of Alaska fishing economies; understanding how Gulf of Alaska fishing communities may adapt to climate change as part of the Gulf of Alaska Climate Integrated Modeling Project; upward mobility and paths of entry for fisheries participants; and extending the incorporation of human dimensions within ecosystem based fisheries management as part of the Gulf of Alaska Integrated Ecosystem Assessment. 

Her work on climate change with Gulf of Alaska fishing communities has illuminated the critical role of climate attribution in proactive adaptation, cascading and cumulative impacts that trap fishermen in coping strategies, and pathways towards resilience in the face of climate change. She is currently working with community partners in Cordova, Kodiak, and Sitka to co-develop fishing economy adaptation plans using locally specific capital assets vulnerability assessments and adaptation strategies. This work builds on previous research examining fishing family adaptations in the Gulf of Alaska to numerous, multifaceted changes across decades. Marysia has researched the role of women internationally and in Alaska fisheries, highlighting their contribution to fishing family adaptive capacity and women’s unique vulnerabilities to shocks in fisheries systems. Marysia serves on numerous fisheries planning and review bodies where she focuses on improving the integration of human dimensions, including the North Pacific Fisheries Management Council’s (NPFMC) Climate Scenarios Workshop Steering Committee, the Alaska Ocean Acidification Network Executive Committee, the NPFMC Social Science Planning Team, the NPFMC’s Gulf of Alaska Groundfish Plan Team, and the cross-regional Catch Shares Working Group.  

Marysia received her PhD from the University of Delaware in Marine Policy, her MA in International Environmental Policy from American University, and her BA from Rutgers University. She resides with her family in Juneau, Alaska, where she is frequently found on top of a mountain. 

Marysia’s research staff includes Andrew Steinkruger and Abigail Sweetman.  

Current research projects

• Advancing understanding of climate adaptation and resilience in Gulf of Alaska fishing communities
  • Despite the present and future adverse impacts of climate-driven changes to fisheries in the Gulf of Alaska, there is a dearth of adaptation planning to ensure the resilience of fishing communities. This project addresses this critical need by working with three of the most highly dependent and diverse fishing communities in the region – Cordova, Kodiak, and Sitka – to develop fisheries adaptation plans. 
  • Visit the project website for more details.
• Gulf of Alaska climate change and fishing communities
  • With many adverse climate-driven impacts projected to continue, accelerate, and potentially synergize, the Gulf of Alaska faces substantial climate risk. Climate change is dramatically altering the marine ecosystem of the region with downturns in several valuable fisheries, decreasing fish sizes, changes in salmon run timing and strength, and algal and jellyfish blooms. Across the many geographically isolated and fishing dependent communities within the Gulf of Alaska, such losses may be devastating for fishermen and their communities that lack economic diversity, make it difficult to maintain fishing-dependent food systems, and erase cultural fishing practices that cannot be replaced. This work uses a multi-faceted, mixed-methods approach to conduct social science research on climate-driven changes, vulnerabilities, and adaptation pathways in Gulf of Alaska fishing communities. 
  • Visit the GOACLIM website for more details.
• Upward mobility and access
  • An aging fisheries demographic poses concerns for the resilience of the fishing industry and fishing communities in Alaska, as many commercial fishermen are on the cusp of retirement without enough young fishermen willing and able to take their place. This project provides a multifaceted analysis of access and upward mobility into fisheries, including through:
    • Examining the nexus of issues around entry into fishing and farming and the differentiated programs that have been developed within these industries to address these issues.  
      • Building the next generation of U.S. commercial fishermen
      • Fishing and Farming: A Generational Crisis
      • A livelihoods assessment of new entrants within the US fisheries agriculture continuum
    • A duration analysis of upward mobility from crewing to limited entry permit acquisition.
      • Upward mobility in Alaska fisheries: A case study of permit acquisition for crewmembers
    • Analysis of quota share movement patterns across communities and an analysis of halibut quota share acquisition since IFQ implementation through the lens duration, dissimilarity, and network analyses as a factor of income, diversification, and fishing portfolios.
• Gulf of Alaska Integrated Ecosystem Assessment
  • The goal of the Sitka Community Integrated Ecosystem Assessment (IEA) efforts is to understand the social and ecological ecosystem in the Sitka Sound to ensure effective Ecosystem-Based Management of the marine resources through partnership with coastal communities, commercial and recreational fishermen, and natural resource managers. This project has focused on:
  • Developing social and economic well-being indicators for fishing communities linked to local marine ecosystems:
    • Sustaining an Alaska coastal community: integrating place based well-being indicators and fisheries participation
  • Extending the integration of human dimensions within IEAs
    • A Conceptual Framework for Incorporating Human Dimensions Into Integrated Ecosystem Assessments
  • Developing social-ecological conceptual models of human connections to places and resources
    • Development of social-ecological conceptual models as the basis for an integrated ecosystem assessment framework in Southeast Alaska
    • Participatory place-based integrated ecosystem assessment in Sitka, Alaska: Constructing and operationalizing a socio-ecological conceptual model for sablefish (Anoplopoma fimbria)
• Women in fisheries
  • Gender norms shape inequities and differential access for women and men across a range of industries. Within fisheries, these types of norms may most readily manifest themselves in fisheries through participation rates across the harvesting and processing sectors, labor divisions, and dimensions of participation. This research extends methodological approaches for examining women’s fisheries participation and demonstrates the multifaceted nature of that participation in Alaska fisheries
    • Genderizing fisheries: Assessing over thirty years of women's participation in Alaska fisheries
    • Addressing the gender gap: using quantitative and qualitative methods to illuminate women's fisheries participation

Previous research staff:

Breena Apgar-Kurtz, Melissa Rhodes-Reese, Kelsi Furman