Since 1980s, the thoughts of the ecosystem approach and integrated marine management (IMM) have become the mainstream of marine management, which gave rise to various theoretical explorations and practical applications. The theories and practices guided by the ecosystem approach in main western oceanic countries are generalized in the paper, and the construction of marine ecological civilization in China is summarized. Meanwhile, the theory of IMM and its evolution and practices were clarified, and the historical development of IMM in China is also reviewed. Based on the discussion, a comparative analysis between the ecosystem approach and IMM is made, and the development direction of ecosystembased marine management is preliminarily proposed.