Using small-scale fisheries as an illustrative case, this publication explores how social protection interventions can be used to reduce the vulnerability and strengthen the resilience of households and communities that depend principally on renewable natural resources to sustain their livelihoods and food security. It identifies and reviews existing social protection policies, schemes and instruments with regard to their potential role in supporting the transition to sustainable natural resource management in fisheries, including the identification of universal and targeted social protection schemes and instruments that fisheries-dependent communities have access to, as well as how these groups are defined within the context of those policies. It gives special attention to social protection in the context of households’ disaster resilience. By providing an overview of the different sources of vulnerability and concrete examples of exclusion affecting actors in the fisheries sector, this publication also increases awareness of the vulnerability of small-scale fishers and fishworkers to natural and human-induced hazards as well as other social, economic or political risks. It shows that small-scale fishers and fishworkers are typically inadequately or totally unprotected. Very important is the recognition that social vulnerabilities are as significant as economic vulnerabilities, and that innovative interventions are needed to provide protections across the specific set of challenges that fishers face in each national and local context.