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now is that the endurance of particular objects and practices relies on their becoming relevant

for multiple “pillars”. These understandings allow us to consider the EU proposal as a

political and discursive act of mobilising culture within the specific cultural and historical

context of fishery management. Moreover this is an act of focusing on and mobilising

specific aspects of culture and tradition, and in doing so it is an act of classifying culture. At

the risk of stating the obvious this proposal is only necessary in order for the tonnara to

operate within a current environmental order where quota are the key technical solution to

overfishing. This proposal is only necessary in the political context of the Mediterranean

characterised by a ‘tuna quota quarrel’ (Addis et al. 2012b, p. 381), where powerful lobbyists

have managed to maintain a stronghold on quota shares. In other words this is a result of a

specific historical moment and mode of environmental ordering.

Conclusion

I conclude this chapter by drawing out two points from the discussion so far. The first

supports my earlier argument about legitimisation and decontextualisation. Describing the

processes of fisher knowledge legitimisation and the universalisation of scientific knowledge

is central to understanding the recent epistemological changes in the tonnara. It is no surprise

really that the EU proposal frames the traditional fishery as a solution to environmental

problems and as a knowledge resource for the future. As I have just outlined, one of the key

justifications for supporting traditional traps in the Mediterranean is for the conservation of

tuna through scientific data collection. The traps are ‘an invaluable “data gold mine”’ that

contribute to the ‘species salvation’ (Ambrioso & Xandri 2015, p. 45). This is similar rhetoric

to that of the Roundtable for Cultural Diversity and Biodiversity for Sustainable

Development, however instead of the tonnara being hailed as a philosophic reserve for the

future, as in the roundtable, in the EU proposal it is valued as a data reserve.

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