According to the Aarhus Convention, the public, that is individuals and their associations, has a right to access environmental information and to participate in environmental decision-making. Consequently, public participation is a fundamental principle within all EU environmental policies, and is for instance required by the Water Framework Directive (WFD), Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD), Maritime Spatial Planning Directive (MSPD) and Habitats Directive (HD).

Public participation is a process in which the concerns, needs and values of the public are incorporated into decision making. However, different levels of participation exist, ranging from passive dissemination of information to active engagement. In international documents, three levels of participation are recognized:

1. “Access to information is the first, basic and important right which is underlying the whole process of participation. Whilst it means that the government informs the public about its plans and the types of documents it wants to adopt at the beginning of the process, it also highlights the right of the public to have access to all information (e.g., drafts, comments and reasoning) throughout the process.” (1)
2. “Consultation is a form of participation where the government invites the public to provide its opinion, comments, views and feed-back on a specific document. Whilst the issues on which the public is consulted are defined by the government, this process should also allow for the public to express opinion on other issues contained in the draft. Consultation can be organized with a broader group of participants from the public.” (1)
3. Active involvement (partnership) means collaboration and jointly undertaken responsibilities at all stages of the decision-making process (agenda setting, issue identification, drafting, decision and implementation).” (1)

In general, participation within Coastal Management and within SAF refers to the third level and should include an active and early involvement of stakeholders. In contrast to the general public, the term stakeholder is more context specific and refers to anybody who has an interest in or, is affected by a decision. This can include those who cause a problem, are affected by a problem, are affected by a solution or are affected by doing nothing.

Engaging stakeholders early in the planning process is considered to be beneficial in order to allow exchange and avoid conflicts, to increase understanding and develop a shared perception of a problem, to enable joint decision making, and to generate local knowledge.

At the same time, disagreements among stakeholders and lacking experiences in participatory approaches among managers or responsible authorities have been among the limiting factors in ICZM case studies. Major weaknesses in stakeholder engagement identified within several ICZM case studies include a late and unbalanced involvement of stakeholder groups. In several cases, the dominance of single stakeholders or stakeholder groups caused polarisation and public outcries and prolonged the planning and implementation process (examples are shown in sections 8.2 and 8.3). In such cases, stakeholder engagement can be costly, time-consuming, labour-intensive and potentially create new conflicts or lead to the escalation of existing ones and ultimately delay the process. Hence, facilitating heterogenic stakeholder groups in order to keep discussions thematically focused and avoiding dominance of single persons or groups can be a major challenge. In order to ensure a successful participatory process, clear objectives, skilled facilitation and supporting tools are needed.