Hans-Kristian Hernes

Environmental Transformation of the State: The USA, Norway, Germany and the UK:

Modern states underwent two major transformations that produced first, the liberal capitalist state and second, the welfare state. Each was accompanied by the migration of a previously confrontational movement into the core of the state. In the creation of the liberal capitalist state, the bourgeoisie could harmonize with the states emerging interest in economic growth. In the creation of the welfare state, the organized working class could harmonize with the states emerging interest in legitimating the political economy by curbing capitalisms instability and inequality. We show that environmental conservation could now emerge as a core state interest, growing out of these established economic and legitimation imperatives. This examination is grounded in a comparative historical study of four countries: the USA, Norway, Germany, and the UK, each of which exemplifies a particular kind of interest representation. We show why the USA was an environmental pioneer around 1970, why it was then eclipsed by Norway, and why Germany now leads in addressing environmental concerns.

Representation in Fisheries Co-Management

Co-management builds on the active involvement in regulatory decision-making of those people whose livelihoods depend on the viability of the natural resource. In contrast to government agencies in a top-down, command-and-control role, co-management schemes divide the responsibilities of regulatory functions between government and user-groups based on the principles of collaboration and partnership. The expected outcome is a more equitable, legitimate and effective management system. The promise of co-management should, however, not lead us to underestimate the problems and risks involved that may lead to failure. Given the state of most fisheries and fish stocks, and the questionable legitimacy of current management regimes, this is something co-management systems can hardly afford.

Fisheries Governance, Social Justice and Participatory Decision-Making

Controversies over distribution of access rights are a distinctive feature of fisheries management. Who should be the beneficiaries and what are the relevant criteria for awarding such benefits? We find it rather surprising that principled fisheries management debates on social justice are so rare. We are equally perplexed that so little attention is paid to issues of justice within social science fisheries research. In this article we try to remedy this, first by outlining some of the arguments in the justice literature to demonstrate their relevance for fisheries governance. Second, the establishment of a particular allocative mechanism — the so-called quota ladders - in Norwegian fisheries is used as an example of how different conceptions of justice can be applied in concrete management settings. We argue that much would be gained if a principled debate among involved stakeholders occurred prior to the actual allocation process; that is if stakeholders would agree on some general rules with regard to what constitute socially just distribution of access rights. In fact, we believe that the issue of participatory decision-making through devolvement of authority and responsibility to stakeholder groups, which is now on the agenda in many countries, would be much easier to realise if a social contract for just fisheries were established at the root.