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CIAO DATE: 5/99
Designing the Ocean Policy Future: Or How Am I Going To Do That? *
School of International Relations
University of Southern California
International Studies Association
40th Annual Convention
Washington, D.C.
February 16–20, 1999
Summaries of where we have been and estimates of where we should be going have become a cottage industry at the end of the twentieth century. The Millennium is a convenient time to take stock even if, unless one is a believer in cabalistic signs indicating the world will end at the end of the twentieth century, the completion of the twentieth century has no significance other than to demonstrate that computer programmers thirty years ago were poor forecasters of the future. If one were to try to find a more historically relevant base point for a new era, the years 1989 to 1991 would serve better than the year 2000. After all, the crumbling of the Berlin Wall in November 1989, the Bush-Gorbachov Summit declaring the end of the Cold War in June 1990, and the abolishment of the Warsaw Pact in March 1991 are better indicators that what was to come after would be significantly different than what came before. In short the twenty-first century began in the last decade of the twentieth century. We must keep this in mind that there has already been a fundamental shift in the forces and alignments of world politics.as we look to at what might happen in ocean management attempts in the first quarter to one third of the twenty-first century
Since there has been a lag in our understanding of the direction of the last ten years’ events, the year 1999 is as good a time as any to try to sum up where we have been and where we might go. Having assessed some of the trends, we are now in a better position to begin the “design” of a twenty-first ocean policy, one that accounts for the policy baggage we bring in from the twentieth century, and estimates the impact of likely future trends in world development.
It is a world of rapid change; a world in which it will require nimbleness to keep up. One assessment of our world shows a fundamental clash between modernity, and post-modernity and the forces of tradition, or in Benjamin Barker’s phrase Jihad Versus McWorld. 1 What Barber is showing is that the forces of globalism—the spread of consumerist capitalism has had a powerful impact on the values, beliefs, laws, norms, societal, business and governmental structures throughout the world, often spread ideas associated with American culture. This has not always proven attractive or acceptable to others who resist absorption into a world capitalist network. In what might be termed a worst case scenario, Samuel Huntington, see many of the same trends as leading to a “clash of civilizations” replacing the cold war clash between two twentieth century superpowers. 2 Francis Fukuyama sees the end of superpower rivalry and the triumph of capitalism as the “end of history” because capitalism, associated with liberal democracy, are the final political and economic structures appropriate for guiding all human civilizations into the future 3
Whether the reader agrees or disagrees with those who try, with broad brush strokes, to look to where the events and trends of the late twentieth century are leading us, certain major changes that came about in the late twentieth century are bound to have a profound impact on what we can do in shaping an ocean policy in the twentieth century that serves both human needs and still leaves the oceans “sustainable.” First, we must account for the rapid changes in communications and transportation. It matters that “Chilean seabass” (or Patagonian Toothfish) can be brought to my local supermarket in the United States. That many others and I find the fish delicious has lead to rapid overfishing of the stock, and it is still out of control. It matters that goods can be moved quickly in large quantities across oceans, even if some are toxic, and even if some of these spill and create localized marine disasters, or long term toxic buildups. It matters that communications throughout the world are virtually instantaneous, making public decision-making more transparent, and sometimes creating bargaining problems since negotiators sometimes finding compromising in public virtually impossible.
Second, like it or not, economic globalization is here to stay. Whatever benefits it may bring in terms of spreading modernity, and improving the material lifestyle of some peoples who live under it, by linking most major economies together, the fate of peoples is linked together in a network of relations over which they have little control. Not all of the economies linked together are equally robust, and when one runs into economic difficulty, the impact, in various degrees, is felt among most of the others. An Asian “meltdown,” a Brazilian inability to defend its currency effects us all. In sum, we can expect a volatile world economy for years to come and consequently not all states will have or be willing to devote the resources to “doing the right things” vis-à-vis the oceans. In addition, borders will be less inviolable than before.
Third, for most of the developing world, their priority for the twenty-first century will remain what it has been for the twentieth century-development. Leaders (sometimes in misguided ways) and peoples of developing countries desire the material benefits enjoyed by the developed (while hoping to hold onto the core of their distinctive beliefs and practices). This means more extractions for the natural world to be devoted to human welfare. It will mean more land degradation, more oceans uses, more forests reduced, more urbanization. It also means more people as populations rise after improvements in public health measures. The hope is that the process will occur in a similar fashion to that of the already developed which has been described by economists an as inverted u-shaped curve. That is as economies grow, they extract more from nature. At some point the reduction of natural capital levels off, and without significantly reducing material wellbeing, these economies become more efficient, learn to substitute, and take less out of nature, perhaps allowing such favored countries to become “sustainable.” But there are no guarantees that it will be possible for current developing states to succeed in development along the u-shaped curve model 4 In sum, environmental problems—including ocean problems—are likely to get worse on or near the territories of developing states in the early twentieth century.
Fourth, with the demise of the Cold War, the remaining (US) and former hegemon (Russia) lack either or both the will and resources to impose a peace on the world. Consequently many groups and even states that depended upon them have decided to go their own way. There are few effective blocs to enforce discipline for fear that a localized outbreak of violence would escalate into a world war. The one remaining hegemon. The United States was willing in the Kuwait-Iraq embroilment to repel Iraq, but it was defending its resource interests as well as protecting a poor innocent state from invasion by its larger neighbor. But the US did not have the will to stick it out in a civil war in Somalia. The old USSR, during the last ten years broke into Russia and its myriad new states, all struggling to establish national identities and viable economies. In the third world and the Balkans, outright wars flared with only limited attempts to stop the violence. Thomas Homer-Dixon, and others, predict a rise in violent rebellions, insurgencies and ethnic clashes brought on by environmental and resources scarcities. 5 In short, we must operate in the early twenty-first century in a world where decisions are more decentralized than in the past; perhaps where decision-makers are less certain they can bring along their followers if they compromise; where decision-makers—public and private—may be more violence prone; and where collective in contrast to national goods may be valued less.
Fifth, also as a consequence of decentralization and diffusion, while we have less to fear that thermonuclear war between the superpowers could commence because of either deliberate decision or error, we have much more to fear that nuclear devices and chemical and biological weapons could be used to send a “message” or spread terror. It is a world in which the weapons or materials to make them are available on the world market, and in which anyone with a master’s degree in engineering, physics or chemistry can assemble the components of terrible weapons. We have not experienced a nuclear disaster, but Tokyo subway riders suffered through a March 1995 attack by the Aum Supreme Truth Cult who used sarin gas on their fellow citizens. In sum, many new players, not just states, are empowered to play a role in world politics at the point of a gun.
Sixth, seventeen years before the collapse of the Soviet Union, many in the developed world were energized to think about the rate at which human being are tapping into natural capital through the Stockholm Conference on the human environment (1972). The conference is a convenient benchmark for the start of the current world environmental movement. It not only energized governments, but also helped galvanize citizen interest in organizations devoted to various types of environmental causes. Many of these are NGO’s (nongovernmental organizations) that directly participate in efforts to influence international environmental policies of governments and international organizations. 6 They as well as governments, are important players in world environmental politics; they often have expert staffs, significant fundraising capabilities, and the ability to arouse a major following to direct action such as boycotts, etc. They depend upon the development of postmodern attitudes in developed states which make peoples in developed states who cannot conceive of going hungry more susceptible to their message. 7
There has been a significant push to make environmental issues first order issues in world politics as a result of the efforts of developed state governments and (largely) developed states NGOs. But from the first UN Law of the Sea Conference in 1958, third world governments have made it clear that they see some developed environmental thrusts as threats to their sovereignty and resources and are determined not to have a fundamentally developed state approach to environmental issues create obligations for them. 8 They have fiercely defended their right to the exploitation of their resources in documents such as the Law of the Sea Convention, the Biodiversity Convention, and the Global Change Convention. This North-South dimension can be expected to be at least the subtext of most environmental interactions in the first third of the twenty-first century. 9 From our perch, observing the end of one century, contemplating what might occur in the next, it is not possible to say with certainty that the future will be brighter or dimmer than the past. Despite the baggage we bring with us from the past so that many of our entanglements will look familiar, there will also be many novel problems we must face. The future is not knowable or predictable. There is no foreordained outcome of the trends I mention, but there is a range of possibilities. Although he did not specifically address ocean issues, Allen Hammond in a recent book, provided scenarios that are based on the trends we can see to think about general future possibilities and which we might use to think about possible ocean futures. He posits three scenarios for the future—Market World, Fortress World, and Transformed World. 10 In Market World economic reform and technological innovation fuel economic growth worldwide. Developed states markets become increasingly integrated, modernization comes to developing states, and presumably we get our assault of natural capital under control through market mechanisms. It is an optimistic vision of the future. Fortress World is much grimmer. It posits a vision of failure of market-led growth to redress social wrongs and environmental disasters, leaves much of humanity out of the benefits of the market, and leads to increasing security problems. The third scenario—Transformed World—posits a world in which new social, political, and economic values arise, capture the loyalty of people and help supplement market forces leading to a better, and environmentally more stable world. What is useful about this way of thinking about the future is that it shows that we have choices, that our policies will count and lead us to something like one of the three.
A Goal for the Future
Scenarios are useful in thinking about options, but individuals or political systems cannot reach a goal without positing a goal. The goal of Transformed World of a world in which we do the “right thing” is so vague that it is, as Hammond admits, visionary. Perhaps as a result of a process we little understand we will make the right decisions and get there, but I suggest we need a practical, and perhaps, intermediate goal to shoot for. That goal must be “sustainability.” While no longer a novel idea, it is a slippery concept. It allows for human use of nature’s bounty, and is often expressed as sustainable use, and sometimes, in the context of third world development, as sustainable development. Sustainable development was defined in the Bruntland Report as ensuring the needs of the present are met without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. 11 Although one group of scholars identified some 20 different definitions in the environmental economics literature alone, 12 and it may turn out that the notion is an oxymoron—that is we can have “sustainability” or use and development, but not both—most analysts and observers believe that, if we work at it in sensible fashion, we can achieve the goal of taking care of human welfare without wrecking the natural system.
As we have seen, in some areas of the world, especially those dominated by developing states, human uses of the natural system will increase. One of the world’s major problems is to be sure that such efforts do not get out of hand. Let us be clear—developing states are determined to develop. Whatever theoretical debate has taken place as to the advisability of development in terms of its overall impact on the world’s stocks of environmental goods, few wish to prevent development, albeit that most developed states have not rushed in to substantially ease developing states burdens. During the first third to half of the new century, the situation may be quite fluid with many areas undergoing rapid environmental, economic, and social change. One of the main tasks will be to stabilize the situation. But stabilization through sustainable development does recognize that human use is permissible, but it must be reasonable and controlled use. On both practical and philosophic grounds, it is neither wise nor feasible to try to create a new Jerusalem or new Eden by severely restricting human expectations. 13
Sustainability as a goal is well established as a goal of future ocean policy. Aspects of it can be seen in the United Nations Law of the Sea Convention, 14 the Straddling Stocks Convention, 15 the North Pacific Haddock Convention, 16 and the conventions coming out of the Rio Earth Summit, 17 and of course Agenda 21—the “workplan” for future environmental policy. 18 But what must we do to achieve sustainability in the oceans of the world? Most of these conventions provide partial answers for the subject it deals with, but an overall plan, or sense of direction is still missing. What is needed to begin the effort is a guide to sustainable actions, a set of principles. A distinguished group of ecologists, scientists, and economists under the aegis of the Luso-American Development Foundation has provided a candidate list. It includes:
Principle 1: Responsibility
Principle 2: Scale-Matching
Principle 3: Precaution
Principle 4: Adaptive Management
Principle 5: Full Cost Allocation
Principle 6: Participation 19
I agree with all items on the list, and before my critique seems to be damning the list by pointing out important problems, I must note that the authors were aware of the limitations of their effort. They were trying to “raise awareness” not provide a complete blueprint. But their proposed changes in human awareness is likely to be reached only if we change rules, norms, and that many of the costs they do not account for are political, legal and institutional costs, and these were hardly mentioned.
It is all very well to call for “responsibility” but they do so without calling for a system of accountability. It is fine to hope that individuals and corporations should feel responsible for carrying on their activities in a sustainable manner, but who should hold them accountable? This raises fundamental jurisdictional issues. Scale-matching or assigning governance decisions to the level of governance to the one with the most relevant information, that can respond quickly and efficiently and can integrate across scale boundaries sounds wonderful! But this raises the age-old tension between centralization versus decentralization that has plagued all human governance. Moreover, in a world still primarily organized on the basis of territorially defined nation-states, if the scale of the problem goes beyond a single nation state, how can we arrange “scale-matching.” This is one of the most critical problems of the management of collective goods, and they never seem to recognize that.
Precaution has become a well-recognized principle in international environmental discourse. But it is one that, in practice, if poorly handled, may lead to more division than solutions. It is easy to agree that because of uncertainty, resource managers should err on the side of caution when we use nature’s bounty. We should take less to avoid making an irreversible mistake. But how cautious should we be? We already have examples of efforts to turn the precautionary principle into an attack on use per se, that is it is possible to be so cautious as, for all practical purposes, stop use. This is one of the many avenues of assault that Preservationist forces have used to stop whaling of abundant species even though there is no scientific justification for doing so. On the other hand, if “reference points” of the Straddling Stocks Agreement 20 or a very risk averse algorithm of IWC’s Revised Management Procedure were implemented (in a Revised Management Scheme) 21 the precautionary principle can make an important contribution to keeping human assaults on the natural system within the bounds of sustainability. But it requires further definition., and it needs an institution to provide and monitor the application of the refined definition.
It is a fundamental principle of environmental economics that an environmental “insult” is external (an “externality”) to the accounted costs of production of a good or service. To solve the problem of dumping unaccounted costs on the ecosystem through a process sometimes called “market failure,” we must develop a practice of internalizing externalities. All users of the ecosystem—if they were accountable for their full costs—would have an incentive to reduce their despoliation of nature. 22 Again, I agree that the authors are on the right track, but what a Pandora’s box they have opened! If this is a task that must be accomplished to save the ocean then they merely have to reform the entire capitalist economic system so that the market does not fail, or, perhaps, where the market absorbs the insults because it has been transformed from an “open” linear economy to a “closed” economy. 23 A tall order. 24
A tall order indeed, made taller by requiring open participation by all peoples in decisions effecting their lives. On democratic theory grounds, it is hard to object, and indeed, there are also good practical reasons for more transparency. For one, the age of backroom deals where the winners can shift the burden to the losers and no outsider is the wiser are over. The West has preached democracy around the world, and it must be prepared to live under the framework it has promoted. The hope, of course, is that the world will make better decisions, ones that will be more easily implemented because those who have to implement are the ones who made the deal. But rules made in open fora suffer from increased transaction costs. It takes more time and money to try to get broad agreement. If the problem requires a time critical solution, it may come too late if all stakeholders must be given a role in the outcome. Many states whose position in an open forum would be seen as weak may be reluctant to enter a negotiating session where it must reveal more than wishes to reveal, or feel pressure to accept an outcome that it ardently dislikes. In sum, open covenants openly arrived at, may result in no covenants.
In sum, we now have a useful list of what should be done but we still flounder over the questions of who should do it, and how. I am reminded of one of favorite TV ads of a few years ago. The scenario shows a travelling salesman on the telephone to his home office. The phone rings and the salesman, in response an order to go to Cleveland tomorrow, said “I can do that.” But in subsequent calls he is ordered to go to Cincinnati, Toledo, Pittsburgh, Chicago, and until the last call he replies he can do that. But in response to the last call, he plaintively replies “how am I going to do that?” How are we going to implement wise principles?
Global Ocean Governance
Most efforts at pointing us toward the future, such as the Lisbon Principles, are predicated on solving important substantive problems. They concentrate on the what But to make real progress we must also solve the who and how problems. They are part of the larger effort to establish the basis of global ocean governance. Governance is what we are after and we won’t develop it unless principles developed by ecologists and economists are incorporated into institutions that have firm jurisdictional reach, are responsible, have adequate resources, and possess a process for making decisions that are considered legitimate. They need not be institutions that posses what we have called sovereignty, but within a system—however challenged—still exhibits traits of anarchy, they must be able to make rules, play roles, and establish relationships that allow them to function within what Oran Young calls a “stateless society.” 25 Today we know a good deal about the formation and functioning of international regimes—the institutions we rely upon to bring order in a stateless society. While Oran Young, perhaps the most noted student of international regimes, has pointed out that an international regime need not be embodied in a formal organization, 26 I suspect that the most effective ones are those that have formal organizations, and if recent hypothesizing is correct, the strongest institutions are those that are “hooked” into the domestic agendas of important states via interest groups. 27
The test of effectiveness is in regime implementation. We need to know whether supposed actors converged expectations led to coordinated action. 28 More broadly, do the agreed principles, norms, rules solve the problems for which they were created? Since most students of international relations, given their training and interest, are experts in regime formation and maintenance, we have, until recently, had less work on regime implementation than the importance of the issue requires. A fairly recent assessment “turned up a mixed picture.” 29 More recent work is available, some of so new I have not had a chance to study it in detail. 30 In addition, I too am participating in a major analytic effort to understand all aspects of regimes. 31 When completed this will help us avoid careless assessments, based on partial data (and the reason I probably should have waited for the results before writing this essay!)
Hubris knows no bounds so instead of waiting, I’ll take a stab at some of what I think we will find. I suspect that while there will be evidence that some regimes have worked well in the absence of formal machinery, and despite the importance of changing the principles and norms in people’s heads even in the absence of “government,” most of the most effective regimes are those with institutions that most resemble governments. While they are intergovernmental and lack sovereignty based authority, to succeed, they need a modicum of authority, resources, and structure.
Authority, that is the claim that the claimant’s writ must be obeyed because claimant has the right to make decisions that must be obeyed, is a key feature of governance. The claim to a right to govern and be obeyed often is derived from the notion of legitimacy. Legitimacy is usually not thought of a critical in an international organization context—after all sovereign states still have a right to defect and not cooperate—and its their mandate that is legitimate, we must begin to develop transnational organizations with similar characteristics. The international order as we know it is changing. Some old states are disappearing, others developing. Some states are increasingly fragmented internally, and finally, “cross-national connections and institutions are challenging an international order dominated by monocentric, hierarchical, and unitary states.” 32 Integration based on voluntary exchange may be easier, but unless we develop a “civic culture” 33 for transnational institutions whose writ should be obeyed, we may drift from anarchy to chaos.
It also seems that a locus of action is needed, one that is visible; one that has live people interacting; people taking actions according to a know familiar and trusted procedure; actions that can be shown on television. In short, it needs a presence. But more than cosmetics are needed; machinery to actually manage and implement decision is needed. Decisions do not make themselves and problem solving requires follow through. It works best if there is a forum for decision and a cadre of people responsible for implementing what has been decided. Resources to operate the machinery and to manage the supervision of implementation are also needed. Finally, to avoid the problem of paying heavy transactions costs in arranging a collective choice only to find that the problem has changed, it would be preferable if the decision system eases the way to adjusting commitments. In short, it can accommodate learning.
If I have assessed the elements of effectiveness correctly, the stronger regimes will have adequate machinery for the performance of their mandated tasks. While Oran Young’s preliminary judgment of a “mixed picture” is correct, and we need to get to the second level of analysis in looking for the factors that provide more refined explanations of outcome, we should not overlook the broad observation that effective regimes need an organization. What degree of success the International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling (IICRW) has achieved, can be attributed to the machinery of the International Whaling Commission with its obligatory procedures and the “hooks” it has into the domestic politics of the United States via the work of Preservationist NGOs. While one can judge that the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission has succeeded because of astute entrepreneurial leadership, the director, Dr. James Joseph, had to have an organization to lead. This is also true of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), which is now in a second phase of its work and adjusting its trade ban lists to reward good actors as well as punish bad actors. Success for LRTAP can partly be claimed because of the role of the European Union in mobilizing its members to fight regional pollution. This is true of NAFTA through its Commission for Environmental Cooperation headquartered in Montreal, Canada., 34 and many other environmental and non-environmental international regimes.
The creation of an organization with structure, people, decision-making procedures, resources is a necessary but not sufficient condition for success in solving a transboundary problem. Establishment of a formal organization is no guarantee that 1) sufficient authority and enforcement powers will be conveyed; 2) that even if conveyed, authority and enforcement powers will be used properly; and 3) the organization will succeed in solving the problem for which it was established. But even if the actions of a formal transnational organization fails to meet stringent tests of effectiveness, usually its actions have advanced the struggle. The question is how well it succeeded compared to the alternatives. This is a much more difficult question to answer. Those focused on finding a cure for the problem almost always complain that existing organizations—national and transnational—achieve only partial or insufficient success. Witness the response of Roger E. McManus:
35
yes, we have laws relating to fisheries, minerals, navigation, protected species, etc. but the authorities are usually inadequate to the management challenge, and they are rarely implemented or enforced to their fullest capacity.
It is difficult being very sympathetic with Mr. MacManus who has mostly been concerned with domestic environmental problems when we consider how much more difficult it is to achieve sustainable outcomes at the regional or international level.
This is one of the reasons why I am so committed on the whaling issue. In 1982 the International Whaling Commission promulgated a moratorium on commercial whaling, and in 1994 it imposed a Southern Ocean Sanctuary. Many environmentalists, especially those of a preservationist persuasion, complain that their effort to end whaling forever have been thwarted by opponents who wish to continue to whale who use exceptions and special provisions in the treaty (e.g. scientific whaling) to avoid a complete shutdown of whaling around the world. What is often overlooked is that the writ of the IWC has been treated as authoritative by all, including opponents. No state has openly disobeyed a legally mandated rule. What they have done does not violate their obligations under the treaty. In sum, the IWC has been treated as an authoritative institution on world whaling. This is rare, and I hope that as a result of what I consider to be bad policy does not result in the breakdown of the IWC and the loss of one of our few authoritative institutions.
Norms and Global Ocean Governance
We know that norms and principles are the basis of governance. What is in peoples’ heads is the basis of what they will do, what they will accept, and what rules they will implement. The study of international regimes is based on the recognition of the importance of norms because they set standards of appropriate behavior. They are the reasons why people obey, and why the writ of certain organizations on subjects where there is a standard of expected behavior is obeyed. But while students of international regimes, resource and environmental regimes included, have understood that accepted norms are the basis of governance, we have not understood well how norms come about and how they change, evolve, and die. Students of international regimes often can learn something about the life history of international norms by reading the works of others, for example, communications specialists, advertising executives, and others whose business it is to propagate the faith. Fortunately, we can now also turn to some recent work by international relations specialists to guide us.
Martha Finnamore and Kathryn Sikkink have begun to raise such questions as “How do we know a norm when we see one? How do we know norms make a difference in politics? Where do norms come from? How do they change.” 36 They hypothesize that norms go through a “life cycle” in which they emerge, they reach a “tipping point,” go through a norm “cascade,” and finally reach a stage of internalization. In the earliest period norm entrepreneurs push a candidate norm. If they are successful in persuading others to listen, they can reach the tipping point where states, international organizations, and networks begin to espouse the idea. It becomes a cascade when formally adopted into the practices of organizations, and finally obedience to the norm becomes habitual by important political organizations, including states and IGOs. Perhaps the most powerful of norms become “metanorms” as described by Robert Axelrod. 37 Axelrod adds to our understanding of norm effectiveness the idea that not only because most members of a community act in a certain way is a norm a norm but because they back their belief with a willingness to punish its violation. A metanorm is one in which community members are not only willing to punish any member who violates the norm, but punish those who do not are not willing to punish a defection.
Much of what has gone on in international environmental discourse since the 1972 Stockholm Conference on the Environment can be seen as an attempt to establish an array of new norms. Some have reached a tipping stage or even been cascaded, and perhaps a few have become internalized. But it seems to me that we need a further test: even if an individual or social unit feels obligated to carry out a particular action, it must calculate the cost. It is not just a matter of doing what is socially sanctioned, but how much it will cost you to do so. Too often we pay lip service to what is right and do not perform what is right if the short-run costs are perceived to be greater than the benefits.
Sustainability is certainly a candidate for a major international norm that should guide our use of renewable resources. Has it gone through the first several stages and been tipped or cascaded? An argument can be constructed that it at least has been tipped, and perhaps cascaded. But it would be difficult to show it has been internalized. We give it lip service, but do we actually reduce our extractions from nature according to the precautionary principle? Have we been willing to scale match the effort to the problem? Most important of all, have we been willing to internalize the externalities we might cause as we use natural capital? Finally, are we willing to punish not only defectors, but also those who refuse to punish defectors? Our record, I suggest, is weak. We talk better than we do. But there may be something different, or at least the timing may be different for different stages. That is, it may be easier (and indeed perhaps a different process) to push a new norm and get people to claim to believe in it than it is to get people to automatically implement it, or further, to punish those who do not implement it. Clearly, it is necessary but not sufficient to have stakeholders—individuals and institutions—say they are in favor of a norm. The final proof of effectiveness is when peoples and institutions behave in a manner consistent with a norm.
A fundamental norm such as sustainability requires the development of rules that can guide specific human behaviors that are consistent with the goals the norm sets. If we are to use the oceans sustainably, we must limit our take to what can be replaced. This essentially means eliminating open entry to the resource; a measure that most ocean exploiters and governments have been loathe to do even after we have changed jurisdictions via the extension of national jurisdiction to 200 nautical miles. Both within and without we push the idea of “responsibility” but there are insufficient rewards or punishments to induce ocean exploiters to keep their takes within the range of what is sustainable. 38 Instead, via the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) we push codes of conduct for fisherman. Essentially this means an appeal to flag states to “take such measures (which measures?) as may be necessary to ensure that fishing vessels entitled to fly its flag [to] not engage in any activity that undermines the effectiveness of international conservation and management measures,” 39 to not reflag fishing vessels, to promise to cooperate in exchanging information, etc. We have done a bit better in the Straddling Stocks Agreement where regional management organizations are mandated for control of straddling stocks and by requiring membership in such organizations for “access to the fishery resource” the agreement takes a step in the direction of limiting entry. 40 It also permits the regional organization’s members to agree on “allocations of allowable catch” or what can be caught, but not who will do the catching. 41 We have done a bit better still in the Bering Sea Pollack Agreement where not only are the parties to meet annually, they are to establish an allowable catch, and divide, by consensus, the catch under non-transferable Individual National Quotas (INQ’s). 42
While these agreements are beginning to create the necessary tools for fostering ocean living resource sustainability, are they too little, too late, too incomplete? Are the governments of most states willing to do what needs to be done, but only if it is in their short run interest to do so because they are negatively impacted by the ecological losses they at least partially caused, or because the cost of implementation is low? 43 Are we condemned to get real cooperation to exploit on a sustainable basis only if we have seriously damaged the resource and the stakeholders have little choice but to comply, and then remediate? And real damage has been done: “landings from global fisheries have shifted in the last 45 years from large piscivorous fishes toward smaller invertebrates and planktivorous fishes, especially in the Northern Hemisphere.” 44 We are moving in the right direction, but too too slowly. We need a holistic ecosystem approach. 45
Back to the Beginning
So that we will have something of value to turn over to our children and grandchildren, it is important we think about our ocean future. Within the limits of what is knowable and reasonably forcastable, we must try to design the appropriate institutions and practices that will prevent human being, who already extract 40% of the world’s natural productivity for their own use, and with increased human population in the twenty-first century are likely to command more, from ruining the earth’s ecosystem. The oceans, the place where life originated should not be the place where it ends. Muddling through will no longer do, but if we are account for the way people really behave, muddle must also be part of the mix.
This is no simple task because we do not understand well the processes we must alter to get to where we should go. We have a decent idea of the ends we should seek, but we need to weave our way in a world in which, if things go badly, we might have fortress world. We seem to be embarked on the early stages of market world, but for environmental issues we are well warned about market failure. Indeed, it is the underlying problem we must master—to get stakeholders to internalize their externalities and take out only what can be sustained.
We are not short of UN and intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations which have the oceans as one, if not their principle, mandate. Stjephan Keckes discovered 14 U.N agencies and 19 IGO’s and NGO’s with oceans as part of their responsibilities. 46 But most of these conduct studies, collect data, provide recommendations, and of course, many of the NGO’s lobby, but few are empowered to make decisions which states of the world are likely or legally required to follow. We need something more. We need:
That’s not much to ask—is it?
Endnotes
*: Prepared for presentation at the 40th annual meeting of the International Studies Association, Washington, D.C., February 16–20, 1999. Back.
Note 1: Benjamin R. Barber, Jihad vs. McWorld New York: Ballentine, 1995. Back.
Note 2: Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of the World Order New York: Simon & Schuster, 1996. Back.
Note 3: Francis Fukuyama The End of History and the Last Man New York: Free Press, 1992 Back.
Note 4: Kenneth Arrow, et. al., “Economic Growth, Carrying Capacity, and the Environment,” 268 (April 28, 1995), p. 520. Back.
Note 5: There is a large literature on ecological causes of insecurity. The latest work is: Thomas Homer-Dixon and Jessica Blitt, eds. EcoviolenceLanhan, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 1998. Back.
Note 6: Thomas Princen and Matthias Finger, eds. Environmental NGOs in World Politics London: Routledge, 1994. Back.
Note 7: Ronald Inglehart Modernization and Postmodernization Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997. For a skeptical reply, see: Willett Kempton, James S. Boster and Jennifer A. Hartley, Environmental Values in American Culture Cambridge: MIT Press, 1997. Back.
Note 8: Robert L. Friedheim, ‘The “Satisfied” and “Dissatisfield” States Negotiate International Law: A Case Study,’ World Politics XVIII: 1 (1965), pp. 20-41; Robert L. Friedheim, “The Law of the Sea and the New International Economic Order,” Marine Technology Society Journal Back.
Note 9: Marian A. L. Miller, The Third World in Global Environmental Politics Boulder: Rienner, 1995, pp. 143-149. Back.
Note 10: Allen Hammond, Which World? Scenarios for the 21st CenturyWashington: Island Press, 1998, pp. 22-25. Back.
Note 11: World Commission on Environment and Development,Our Common Future (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987, p.8. Back.
Note 12: Andrea Barazini and Gonzague Pillet, “The Physical and Biological Environment—The Socioeconomy of Sustainable Development,” in Beat Burgermeier, ed. Economy, Environment, and Technology Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 1994, p. 140. Back.
Note 13: Jared Diamond, “The Golden Age That Never Was,” in The Third Chimpanzee New York: Harper, 1992, pp. 317-338. Back.
Note 14: United Nations, The Law of the Sea: Official Text New York: United Nations, 1983. Back.
Note 15: United Nations, Agreement for the implementation of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea of 10 December 1982 Relating to the Conservation and Management of Straddling Fish Stocks and Highly Migratory Fish Stocks (A/CONF.164/37) 8 September 1995. Hereafter referred to as the Straddling Stocks Convention. Back.
Note 16: Convention on the Conservation and Management of Pollack Resources in the Central Bering Sea, 16 June 1994, reprinted in United Nations, Law of the Sea: Bulletin No. 27 New York: United Nations, 1995, pp. 84-91. Back.
Note 17: Rio Conventions Back.
Note 18: Agenda 21: Programme of Action for Sustainable Development New York: United Nations, Back.
Note 19: Robert Costanza, et. al., “Principles for Sustainable Governance of the Oceans,” Science281 (10 July 1998), p. 198-199 Back.
Note 20: Article 6(3)(b), Straddling Stocks Agreement. Back.
Note 21: For a more complete analysis of this issue, see: Robert L. Friedheim, ed.Toward A Sustainable Whaling Regime, forthcoming 2000. Back.
Note 22: William J. Baumol and Wallace E. Oates, The Theory of Environmental Policy Englewood Cliffs.NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1975, p. 16. Back.
Note 23: David W. Pearce and R. Kerry Turner, Economics of Natural Resources and the Environment Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1990, pp. 43-58. Back.
Note 24: For a similar skeptical concern with “full cost” pricing, see the lettter to the editor: Paul Stern, “Consumption and Sustainable Development,” Science 276 (13 June 1997), p. 1629. Back.
Note 25: Oran R. Young, International Governance: Protecting the Environment in a Stateless Society Ithaca,NY: Cornell University Press, 1994; Oran R. Young, ed., Global Governance: Drawing Insights from the Environmental Experience Cambridge: MIT Press, 1996. Back.
Note 26: Oran R. Young, International Cooperation: Building Regimes for Natural Resources and the Environment Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1989, p. 36. Back.
Note 27: Lisa L. Martin and Beth Simmons, “Theories and Empirical Studies of International Institutions,” International Organization 52:4 (Autumn 1998), p.756 Back.
Note 28: Steven D. Krasner, ed. International Regimes Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1983. Back.
Note 29: Young, International Governance p. 172. Back.
Note 30: David Victor, Kal Raustiala, March Levy and Edward Miles, The Implementation and Effectiveness of International Environmental Commitments: Theory and Practice Cambridge: MIT Press, 1998. Back.
Note 31: This effort is the development of an international regimes database under the leadership of Helmut Breitmeier, Marc A. Levy, Oran R. Young, and Michael Zurn so that propositions about regime formation, maintenance and effectiveness can be answered empirically. It was originally sponsored by the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, Vienna, Austria. Back.
Note 32: James G. March and Johan Olsen, “The Institutional Dynamics of International Political Orders,” International Organization 52:4 (Autumn 1998), p. 946. Back.
Note 33: Gabriel Almond and Sidney Verba, Civic Culture Boston: Little, Brown, 1963. Back.
Note 34: John Kirton, “NAFTA’s Trade and Environment Regime in Action: Implications for Hemispheric Expansion,” Paper presented at the Center for International Studies, School of International Relations, University of Southern California, October 28, 1997. Back.
Note 35: Ocean and Coastal Policy Network News 1:1, p. 9. Back.
Note 36: Martha Finnemore and Kathryn Sikkink, “International Norm Dynamics and Political Change,” International Organization 52:4 (Autumn 1998), p. 888. Back.
Note 37: Robert Axelrod, “Promoting Norms,” in The Complexity of Cooperation Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997, pp. 44-68 Back.
Note 38: At least one group of scientists warn us to “distrust claims of sustainability” and fear that we will not be able to manage effectively unless human motivation and responses are part of the system to be managed. Donald Luudwig, Ray Hilborn, Carl Walters, “Uncertainty, Resource Exploitation, and Conservation: Lessons from History,” Science 260 (2 April 1993), p. 17. Back.
Note 39: Article 1, AGREEMENT TO PROMOTE COMPLIANCE WITH INTERNATIONAL CONSERVATION AND MANAGEMENT MEASURES BY FISHING VESSELS ON THE HIGH SEAS,FAO. This is language similar to the Pelly Amendment to the Magnuson Fisheires Act in the USA that has embroiled the United States in losing GATT cases concerning Tuna-Dolphin. Back.
Note 40: Article 8(4) Straddling Stocks Convention. Back.
Note 41: Article 10(b) Straddling Stocks Convention. Back.
Note 42: Articles 3.4, and 8, Central Bering Sea Agreement. Back.
Note 43: Detlef Sprinz and Tapani Vaahtoranta, “The interest-based explanation of international environmental policy,” International Organization 48:1 (Winter 1994), pp. 77-105 Back.
Note 44: Daniel Pauly, Villy Christensen, Johanne Dalsgaard, Rainer Froese, Francisco Torres, Jr., “ Fishing Down Food Webs,” Science 279 (6 February 1998), pp. 860-863. Back.
Note 45: Louis W. Botsford, Juan Carlos Castilla, Charles H. Peterson, “The Management of Fisheries and Marine Ecosystems,” Science 277 (25 July 1997), pp. 509-515. Back.
Note 46: Stjephan Keckes, “Review of International Programmes Revelant to the Work of the Independent World Commission on the Oceans,” prepared for the Independent World Commission on the Oceans, 1 February 1997. Back.
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