The concept of the ocean as common shared by all humans has been controversial for a long history. Many existing research tends to center around the capital relationships, legal statuses, and issues of accessibility around the ocean, which presume ocean commons as static and bounded properties. This study, however, wants to mobilize the notion of common as a verb, namely, “commoning” (Gibson-Graham et al., 2016), to explore the dynamic relationships between coastal communities and the ocean. During the energy transformation of Taiwan in recent years, the large-scale MRE development created friction among coastal residents, fishermen, and local governments, yet it also created a new space for debating, negating, and collaboration where both human and non-human actants are involved. Based on the forthcoming ethnographic fieldwork in Taiwan, this study asks: How do old coastal communities develop, reconstruct, and evolve into new ocean commoning-communities, or how do they disintegrate during the development of Marine Renewable Energy (MRE)? What are the new goals and responsibilities to drive them together? How do non-human actants shape the commoning process, and how do they challenge the traditional paradigm of energy that is based on mathematical and scientific understanding? By exploring the commoning process around large-scale and state-leading MRE development, this study aims to understand the political potential of more-than-human commoning-communities and opens up the space for re-imagine the more socially inclusive and environmentally just energy future, where the state and large cooperation inevitably involved.
