Author
Bonnie J. McCay
Bio: Bonnie J. McCay is an academic researcher from Rutgers University. The author has contributed to research in topics: Fisheries management & Commons. The author has an hindex of 33, co-authored 82 publications receiving 6122 citations.
Topics: Fisheries management, Commons, Fisheries law, Fishing, Property rights
Papers published on a yearly basis
Papers
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TL;DR: Evidence accumulated over the last twenty-two years indicates that private, state, andcommunal property are all potentially viable resource management options.
Abstract: Hardin's Tragedy of the Commons model predicts the eventual overexploitation or degradation of all resources used in common. Given this unambiguous prediction, a surprising number of cases exist in which users have been able to restrict access to the resource and establish rules among themselves for its sustainable use. To assess the evidence, we first define common-property resources and present a taxonomy of property-rights regimes in which such resources may be held. Evidence accumulated over the last twenty-two years indicates that private, state, andcommunal property are all potentially viable resource management options. A more complete theory than Hardin's should incorporate institutional arrangements and cultural factors to provide for better analysis and prediction.
1,249 citations
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TL;DR: In this article, the institutional problems associated with co-management have been analyzed from the perspective of rational choice, and the authors offer another perspective by analyzing these problems from the standpoint of how institutions are embedded in human community.
593 citations
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TL;DR: A number of examples show that this is not necessarily so as discussed by the authors, and that resources held in common will not always be over-expoited, the "tragedy of the commons".
Abstract: Conventional wisdom holds that resources held in common will invariably be overexploited — the "tragedy of the commons". A number of examples show that this is not necessarily so.
530 citations
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TL;DR: In this paper, the authors summarized the findings of two partly overlapping comparative international projects on government-industry interaction in fisheries management in the seven Nordic countries, the USA, Canada, Spain, France and New Zealand.
394 citations
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TL;DR: The authors consider four criticisms of ecological anthropology: its overemphasis on energy, its inability to explain cultural phenomena, its preoccupation with static equilibria, and its lack of clarity about the appropriate units of analysis.
Abstract: In this essay we consider four criticisms of ecological anthropology: its overemphasis on energy, its inability to explain cultural phenomena, its preoccupation with static equilibria, and its lack of clarity about the appropriate units of analysis. Recognizing that some of these criticisms may not be justified, we nevertheless point to parallel concerns in ecology. Further, we ask whether new directions indicated by some ecologists might be appropriate paths for future work in ecological anthropology. A central theme is the desirability of focusing on environmental problems and how people respond to them. The kind of environmental problems we are especially concerned with here are those constituting hazards to the lives of the organisms experiencing them. In other words, we are particularly concerned with problems that carry the risk of morbidity or mortality, the risk of losing an "existential game" in which success consists simply in staying in the game (82, 85; cf 80, cited in 78). Our focus upon hazards and responses to them emerges partly from consideration of neo-Darwinian selection theory. As Colinvaux (22, p. 499) notes: "Selection . . . chooses from among individuals those which are best adapted to avoid the hazards of life at that time and place." Our focus reflects also the new concern of biologists such as Slobodkin (81, 82, 85) with the actual processes of responding to hazards or environmental perturbations rather than with formal alterations in hypothetical genetic systems. Related also is the emerging view among medical scientists that health is a "continuing property, potentially measurable by the individual's ability to rally from insults, whether chemical, physical, infectious, psychological, or social" (7, 8; cf 78). At least some and perhaps all of the insults referred to in the preceding quotation can be subsumed in our category of hazards; even social and psychological insults may evoke physiological "stress" and disease (60, 79) as well as psychological and behavioral adaptive strategies (99). A further influence on us has been the recent proliferation of research and thinking on problems of human response to "natural hazards" in geography (19,
285 citations
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TL;DR: The resilience perspective is increasingly used as an approach for understanding the dynamics of social-ecological systems as mentioned in this paper, which emphasizes non-linear dynamics, thresholds, uncertainty and surprise, how periods of gradual change interplay with periods of rapid change and how such dynamics interact across temporal and spatial scales.
Abstract: The resilience perspective is increasingly used as an approach for understanding the dynamics of social–ecological systems. This article presents the origin of the resilience perspective and provides an overview of its development to date. With roots in one branch of ecology and the discovery of multiple basins of attraction in ecosystems in the 1960–1970s, it inspired social and environmental scientists to challenge the dominant stable equilibrium view. The resilience approach emphasizes non-linear dynamics, thresholds, uncertainty and surprise, how periods of gradual change interplay with periods of rapid change and how such dynamics interact across temporal and spatial scales. The history was dominated by empirical observations of ecosystem dynamics interpreted in mathematical models, developing into the adaptive management approach for responding to ecosystem change. Serious attempts to integrate the social dimension is currently taking place in resilience work reflected in the large numbers of sciences involved in explorative studies and new discoveries of linked social–ecological systems. Recent advances include understanding of social processes like, social learning and social memory, mental models and knowledge–system integration, visioning and scenario building, leadership, agents and actor groups, social networks, institutional and organizational inertia and change, adaptive capacity, transformability and systems of adaptive governance that allow for management of essential ecosystem services.
4,899 citations
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TL;DR: Promising strategies for addressing critical problems of the environment include dialogue among interested parties, officials, and scientists; complex, redundant, and layered institutions; a mix of institutional types; and designs that facilitate experimentation, learning, and change.
Abstract: Human institutions—ways of organizing activities—affect the resilience of the environment. Locally evolved institutional arrangements governed by stable communities and buffered from outside forces have sustained resources successfully for centuries, although they often fail when rapid change occurs. Ideal conditions for governance are increasingly rare. Critical problems, such as transboundary pollution, tropical deforestation, and climate change, are at larger scales and involve nonlocal influences. Promising strategies for addressing these problems include dialogue among interested parties, officials, and scientists; complex, redundant, and layered institutions; a mix of institutional types; and designs that facilitate experimentation, learning, and change.
3,706 citations
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TL;DR: The Logic of Collective Action (LCA) as mentioned in this paper was a seminal work in modern democratic thought that challenged the assumption that groups would tend to form and take collective action in democratic societies.
Abstract: With the publication of The Logic of Collective Action in 1965, Mancur Olson challenged a cherished foundation of modern democratic thought that groups would tend to form and take collective action...
3,231 citations
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TL;DR: New insights about the management of large-scale resources that depend on international cooperation and the conditions most likely to favor sustainable uses of common-pool resources are discussed.
Abstract: In a seminal paper, Garrett Hardin argued in 1968 that users of a commons are caught in an inevitable process that leads to the destruction of the resources on which they depend. This article discusses new insights about such problems and the conditions most likely to favor sustainable uses of common-pool resources. Some of the most difficult challenges concern the management of large-scale resources that depend on international cooperation, such as fresh water in international basins or large marine ecosystems. Institutional diversity may be as important as biological diversity for our long-term survival.
2,463 citations
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24 Nov 2003
TL;DR: The Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MEA) as discussed by the authors is a conceptual framework for analysis and decision-making of ecosystems and human well-being that was developed through interactions among the experts involved in the MA as well as stakeholders who will use its findings.
Abstract: This first report of the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment describes the conceptual framework that is being used in the MA. It is not a formal assessment of the literature, but rather a scientifically informed presentation of the choices made by the assessment team in structuring the analysis and framing the issues. The conceptual framework elaborated in this report describes the approach and assumptions that will underlie the analysis conducted in the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment. The framework was developed through interactions among the experts involved in the MA as well as stakeholders who will use its findings. It represents one means of examining the linkages between ecosystems and human well-being that is both scientifically credible and relevant to decision-makers. This framework for analysis and decision-making should be of use to a wide array of individuals and institutions in government, the private sector, and civil society that seek to incorporate considerations of ecosystem services in their assessments, plans, and actions.
2,427 citations