ICZM is a planning process involving complex decision-making. The decisions are normally not taken by one stakeholder, but are the result of various actions and plans of stakeholders. These stakeholders are in various sectors and operate on different institutional levels. Each of them must be sufficiently informed. This requires excellent communication facilities. It must be avoided that policy makers, coastal zone specialists and stakeholder groups only use their own definitions and terms.

Role-plays are powerful tools to help stakeholders explore the consequences of day-to-day management decisions from the perspective of different stakeholders in the public and private sector, interactively. Participants play a role in small groups of people. They analyse options, take decisions, and receive feed-back on the consequences of both their own and other players' decisions through a computer simulation model. Some examples are:

• CORONA (role play for ICZM)
• Fishman (role play for regional fisheries management)