James Acheson
Dados Biográficos
| ID | 3580989 |
|---|---|
| NOME | James Acheson |
| PRENOMES | James |
| SOBRENOME | Acheson |
| ASSINATURA | ACHESON J |
| AFILIAÇÕES | University of Maine |
| VERIFICADO | Não |
| TOTAL DE OBRAS | 64 |
| TOTAL DE CITAÇÕES | 418 |
| TOTAL COMO AUTOR | 63 |
| TOTAL COMO EDITOR | 1 |
| PRIMEIRO ANO DE PUBLICAÇÃO | 1972 |
| ANO MAIS RECENTE DE PUBLICAÇÃO | 2022 |
| ÍNDICE H | 8 |
Human Ecology of the Commons
The Lobster Fiefs Revisited
Schopenhauer, Nietzsche and D. H. Lawrence’s Women in Love
D. H. Lawrence began to read Schopenhauer and Nietzsche while a student at Nottingham University College. The influence of the two philosophers on his early short stories and his novels from The White Peacock (1911) through to The Rainbow (1915) has been considered at length in books and essays on Lawrence. There has been little discussion to date, though, of the presence of Schopenhauer and Nietzsche in Women in Love (1920). The unmistakably Nie…
Fishing and Marine Resources
Fish and other marine resources have long provided a substantial portion of the food consumed by humans. Fishing societies have developed a number of institutions to reduce the risks of fishing. Today a high percentage of stocks are overfished. Anthropologists have described a number of cases where stocks have been well managed at the local level. They have also investigated a number of ways to improve management. Aquaculture promises to provide …
Common Property
To avoid confusion about common property, it is important to distinguish between common‐pool goods and the governance regimes that manage those goods (e.g., private property, government, local rules). Classic theory regards a “commons” as inefficient and subject to extreme overexploitation. Yet many common‐pool resources can be well managed at the local level, as many studies by anthropologists have shown. Generating management rules necessitates…
Evidence of cultural group selection in territorial lobstering in Maine
Relatively little is known about how resource conservation practices and institutions emerge. We examine the historical emergence of territoriality and conservation rules in Maine's lobstering industry, using a cultural evolutionary perspective. Cultural evolution suggests that cultural adaptations such as practices and institutions arise as a result of evolutionary selection pressure. The cultural multilevel selection framework of Waring et al. …
Offshore wind power development in Maine
In this article, we explore the social, cultural, and political factors promoting and impeding development of offshore wind power in Maine, using the perspective of rational choice theory. Offshore floating wind platforms involve a new technology still in the experimental stage. Developing offshore wind power will require having very large scale organizations to build and finance wind farms capable of generating and transmitting electricity at co…
Spatial and Temporal Patterns in the Cod Fisheries of the North Atlantic
Atlantic Cod Gadus morhua has been subject to commercial exploitation since the thirteenth century. An analysis of cod fisheries over space and time reveals a pattern of serial depletion that reflects the cross-scale interaction of fish population structure, economic incentives, developments in fishing technology, and government efforts to limit access to fishing areas. Three case studies from Newfoundland and Labrador, the larger Northwest Atlan…
Individual transferable quotas and conservation
Individual transferable quotas (ITQs) have become a popular management tool for fisheries. They have been promoted in some quarters and seriously criticized in others because of their social and economic impacts. A more serious problem is that ITQs provide exclusive access to public resources presumably in return for some public benefit, namely conservation; however, in a high percentage of cases they do not conserve fish stocks. In this article,…
Private Land and Common Oceans
In the literature on property rights, there is general consensus framed by people such as Boserup and Demsetz that common property regimes will change to private property regimes when resources are scarce and population increases. This is mostly correct where land tenure is concerned. However, there are many cases where common property regimes continue even though the population has grown and resources have become scarcer. Ocean areas are almost …
The cost of useful knowledge and collective action in three fisheries
The Lobster Gangs of Maine
Bibliography: p. [169]-176
Ostrom for anthropologists
Elinor Ostrom has devoted much of her career to understanding the conditions under which people have incentives to conserve or over-exploit common-pool resources (e.g., oceans, air, irrigation, unowned forests and grassland). While a growing number of anthropologists have taken an interest in this critically important topic, her work is not well known to many anthropologists. This paper describes three different aspects of Ostrom’s work which sho…
Ostrom for anthropologists
Elinor Ostrom has devoted much of her career to understanding the conditions under which people have incentives to conserve or over-exploit common-pool resources (e.g., oceans, air, irrigation, unowned forests and grassland). While a growing number of anthropologists have taken an interest in this critically important topic, her work is not well known to many anthropologists. This paper describes three different aspects of Ostrom’s work which sho…
The Evolution of the Maine Lobster V-Notch Practice
Acheson, J., and R. Gardner. 2011. The evolution of the Maine lobster V-notch practice: cooperation in a prisoner's dilemma game. Ecology and Society 16(1): 41. https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-04004-160141
Failure and Success in Fisheries Management in the Gulf of Maine
Pam Puntenney is contributing editor of "Views on Policy," the AAA Committee on Public Policy column in Anthropology News. Keywords: ecology and environment,natural resource management,public policy
Factions, Models and Resource Regulation
Maine land
In the burgeoning literature on property rights, relatively little analysis has been done on the relation between property rights regimes (i.e., individual property, state property, clan property), and the types of goods that are produced. In Maine [U.S.A.], the decisions of landowners are strongly influenced by government regulation which creates a number of types of goods. In addition, some of the rights to that land are appropriated by the pub…
Maine land
In the burgeoning literature on property rights, relatively little analysis has been done on the relation between property rights regimes (i.e., individual property, state property, clan property), and the types of goods that are produced. In Maine [U.S.A.], the decisions of landowners are strongly influenced by government regulation which creates a number of types of goods. In addition, some of the rights to that land are appropriated by the pub…
Inheritance, Land Sales and the Future of Maine's Forests
Large areas of the world’s forests are being converted to non-forest use. Th is article examines factors influencing decisions of small forest landowners in Maine to convert or sell their land. Our analysis is based on a large-scale survey of a random sample drawn from the membership lists of organizations of forest landowners in 2005. Maine landowners are caught between countervailing pressures. Although many of them love their land and want to …
Maine
Views Icon Views Article contents Figures & tables Video Audio Supplementary Data Peer Review Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Tools Icon Tools Get Permissions Cite Icon Cite Search Site Citation James Acheson; Maine: On the Cusp of the Forest Transition. Human Organization 1 June 2008; 67 (2): 125–136. doi: https://doi.org/10.17730/humo.67.2.p84723j630q42620 Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends …
Causes of Deforestation
Lobster and Groundfish Management in the Gulf of Maine
Many of the world’s most important fisheries are in a state of crisis. The Maine lobster industry is one of the very few exceptions, with catches at an all time high. Much of the success of this fishery stems from effective conservation legislation, passed largely through the long-term lobbying activities of powerful factions within the industry itself. In stark contrast is the Maine groundfishery, where stocks and catches have never been so low.…
Institutional Failure in Resource Management
Many of the world's natural resources are in a state of crisis. The solution to this crisis is to develop effective management institutions, but there is no consensus on what those institutions are. Some economists favor solving resource-management problems through the institution of private property; others advocate central government control; and many anthropologists see local-level management as the solution. In this review, I argue that all t…
Fishers at Work, Workers at Sea
Anthropology of Fishing
Infrastructures are material forms that allow for the possibility of exchange over space. They are the physical networks through which goods, ideas, waste, power, people, and finance are trafficked. In this article I trace the range of anthropological ...Read More
Institutional Failure in Resource Management
Many of the world's natural resources are in a state of crisis. The solution to this crisis is to develop effective management institutions, but there is no consensus on what those institutions are. Some economists favor solving resource-management problems through the institution of private property; others advocate central government control; and many anthropologists see local-level management as the solution. In this review, I argue that all t…
Order out of Chaos
SThe current crisis in the world's fisheries indicates the need for a different management method than that now used by Western scientists, which regulates the quantity of fish taken. The authors propose a method called parametric management, which takes into account the complex, chaotic nature offish stocks and emphasizes preserving regular biological processes in the life cycle of fish by controlling how people fish. Supporting data come from 2…
Private Land and Common Oceans
In the literature on property rights, there is general consensus framed by people such as Boserup and Demsetz that common property regimes will change to private property regimes when resources are scarce and population increases. This is mostly correct where land tenure is concerned. However, there are many cases where common property regimes continue even though the population has grown and resources have become scarcer. Ocean areas are almost …
Limited Good or Limited Goods? Response to Economic Opportunity in a Tarascan Pueblo 1
This article describes the differential response to new economic opportunities in Cuanajo, a Tarascan Indian community in Michoacán, Mexico. It is argued here that blocks to development are primarily economic in nature, not cultural or cognitive (e.g., “limited good”) as has been asserted by others working in the area. When real opportunities became available, some individuals responded to them. Such positive forces lead us to reevaluate some bas…
Strategies, Conflict, and the Emergence of Territoriality
In this article, we use game theory to understand the emergence of various kinds of territorial arrangements in the Maine lobster fishery during the past century. Using the Nash equilibria of models of the fishery as our theoretical framework, we show that informal territorial arrangements in this fishery went through three sequential stages. These stages are the result of decisions by groups of lobster fishermen to defend fishing areas or invade…
Barter and Cash Sale on Lake Titicaca
A review of recent work in economic anthropology finds three competing approaches: decision theory, culturalism, and neo-Marxism. These approaches are tested with data on four dimensions of the cash sale and barter of fish on Lake Titicaca, Peru. The first is somewhat more successful, although the others also explain some data. Comparisons are drawn with barter and cash sale elsewhere in the Andes
Accounting Concepts and Economic Opportunities in a Tarascan Village
One factor influencing business decisions in Cuanajo, Michoacán is the native system of accounts. While accounting systems influence many areas of business decision making, their impact can be most readily seen in analyzing business entry choices. The degree to which accounting systems influence perceptions of opportunities is demonstrated by comparing the local view of business possibilities derived from the native system of accounts (the "emic"…
The Politics of Managing the Maine Lobster Industry
Technical innovation in the New England fin-fishing industry
Studies of the diffusion of innovations have produced very inconsistent results. Downs and Mohr state that the problem lies in the way innovation is conceived and argue that the diffusion of innovations can only be understood by considering the match, or compatability, between the innovations and their potential adopters, and not by studying the innovations or adopters separately and out of context. Our study of the diffusion of 18 technical inno…
Clearcutting Maine
Evidence of cultural group selection in territorial lobstering in Maine
Relatively little is known about how resource conservation practices and institutions emerge. We examine the historical emergence of territoriality and conservation rules in Maine's lobstering industry, using a cultural evolutionary perspective. Cultural evolution suggests that cultural adaptations such as practices and institutions arise as a result of evolutionary selection pressure. The cultural multilevel selection framework of Waring et al. …
Maine land
In the burgeoning literature on property rights, relatively little analysis has been done on the relation between property rights regimes (i.e., individual property, state property, clan property), and the types of goods that are produced. In Maine [U.S.A.], the decisions of landowners are strongly influenced by government regulation which creates a number of types of goods. In addition, some of the rights to that land are appropriated by the pub…
Spatial Strategies and Territoriality in the Maine Lobster Industry
Although territoriality of one kind or another is found in every society, our understanding of the way territorial systems come into being remains undeveloped. In this article, we use game theory to understand the evolution of institutional arrangements in the Maine lobster fishery. Nash equilibrium of models explains the three stages observed in the local-scale informal system of the past century. These stages are the result of decisions to inva…
Distribution Fights, Coordination Games, and Lobster Management
Currently, one of the most important issues in resource management is: under what conditions will people conserve the resources on which their livelihood depends? In all too many cases, overexploitation is the rule. All around the world fish stocks, forests, grasslands, air, soils, wildlife, and water quality have been seriously degraded by human beings. Environmental disaster is not inevitable, however, for in many cases those who are dependent …
Limitations on Firm Size in a Tarascan Pueblo
This paper examines the factors limiting the size and degree of specialization of furniture producing firms in Cuanajo, Michoacan, Mexico, where rapid modernization and mechanization of the furniture industry has resulted in a proliferation of small unspecialized firms rather than the growth of either a few large firms or small, highly specialized firms. A study of the internal rates of return on investment demonstrates that it is economically wo…
Reply to George Foster
The Evolution of the Maine Lobster V-Notch Practice
Acheson, J., and R. Gardner. 2011. The evolution of the Maine lobster V-notch practice: cooperation in a prisoner's dilemma game. Ecology and Society 16(1): 41. https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-04004-160141
Causes of Deforestation
The Anatomy of the Maine Lobster Comanagement Law
In fisheries management circles, there is growing interest in comanagement in which authority for managing fish stocks is shared between government agencies and the fishing industry. This article discusses the implementation of the new comanagement system in the Maine lobster industry, which was initiated in 1995. The law has clearly been successful in that lobster fishermen have been able to generate rules to constrain their own exploitive effor…
The Question of the Commons
Beckett Translating/Translating Beckett
Government Regulation and Exploitive Capacity
The U.S. Fisheries Conservation and Management Act was designed to control the exploitation of commercial marine species. However, during the first two years after this act went into effect in New England in 1977, the overall economic and regulatory environment sent fishermen a mixed set of signals. Some factors, including aspects of regulation, stimulated expansion of the groundfishing fleet; others had the opposite effect. Two surveys indicated…
Offshore wind power development in Maine
In this article, we explore the social, cultural, and political factors promoting and impeding development of offshore wind power in Maine, using the perspective of rational choice theory. Offshore floating wind platforms involve a new technology still in the experimental stage. Developing offshore wind power will require having very large scale organizations to build and finance wind farms capable of generating and transmitting electricity at co…
Individual transferable quotas and conservation
Individual transferable quotas (ITQs) have become a popular management tool for fisheries. They have been promoted in some quarters and seriously criticized in others because of their social and economic impacts. A more serious problem is that ITQs provide exclusive access to public resources presumably in return for some public benefit, namely conservation; however, in a high percentage of cases they do not conserve fish stocks. In this article,…
Limited Good or Limited Goods? Response to Economic Opportunity in a Tarascan Pueblo 1
This article describes the differential response to new economic opportunities in Cuanajo, a Tarascan Indian community in Michoacán, Mexico. It is argued here that blocks to development are primarily economic in nature, not cultural or cognitive (e.g., “limited good”) as has been asserted by others working in the area. When real opportunities became available, some individuals responded to them. Such positive forces lead us to reevaluate some bas…
Accounting Concepts and Economic Opportunities in a Tarascan Village
One factor influencing business decisions in Cuanajo, Michoacán is the native system of accounts. While accounting systems influence many areas of business decision making, their impact can be most readily seen in analyzing business entry choices. The degree to which accounting systems influence perceptions of opportunities is demonstrated by comparing the local view of business possibilities derived from the native system of accounts (the "emic"…
Reply to Mary Lee Nolan
Reply to George Foster
The lobster fiefs
New Directions in Economic Anthropology? A Comment on Kunkel
Chess with the audience
Madness and Mysticism in Beckett's Not I
Anthropology of Fishing
Infrastructures are material forms that allow for the possibility of exchange over space. They are the physical networks through which goods, ideas, waste, power, people, and finance are trafficked. In this article I trace the range of anthropological ...Read More
Limitations on Firm Size in a Tarascan Pueblo
This paper examines the factors limiting the size and degree of specialization of furniture producing firms in Cuanajo, Michoacan, Mexico, where rapid modernization and mechanization of the furniture industry has resulted in a proliferation of small unspecialized firms rather than the growth of either a few large firms or small, highly specialized firms. A study of the internal rates of return on investment demonstrates that it is economically wo…
Technical innovation in the New England fin-fishing industry
Studies of the diffusion of innovations have produced very inconsistent results. Downs and Mohr state that the problem lies in the way innovation is conceived and argue that the diffusion of innovations can only be understood by considering the match, or compatability, between the innovations and their potential adopters, and not by studying the innovations or adopters separately and out of context. Our study of the diffusion of 18 technical inno…
Government Regulation and Exploitive Capacity
The U.S. Fisheries Conservation and Management Act was designed to control the exploitation of commercial marine species. However, during the first two years after this act went into effect in New England in 1977, the overall economic and regulatory environment sent fishermen a mixed set of signals. Some factors, including aspects of regulation, stimulated expansion of the groundfishing fleet; others had the opposite effect. Two surveys indicated…
"Comments on "Any Comments on the Sociology Section, Tony
Barter and Cash Sale on Lake Titicaca
A review of recent work in economic anthropology finds three competing approaches: decision theory, culturalism, and neo-Marxism. These approaches are tested with data on four dimensions of the cash sale and barter of fish on Lake Titicaca, Peru. The first is somewhat more successful, although the others also explain some data. Comparisons are drawn with barter and cash sale elsewhere in the Andes
Beckett Translating/Translating Beckett
The benefits of the commons
The Lobster Gangs of Maine
The Lobster Gangs of Maine
The Question of the Commons
The Question of the Commons
The Tragedy of the Commons
The Lobster Gangs of Maine
Lake Erie Fishermen
British and Irish Drama Since 1960
Household Ecology
Economics (35 obras) · Biology (25 obras) · Geography (25 obras) · Business (24 obras) · Sociology (24 obras) · Political science (22 obras) · Computer Science (20 obras) · Fishery (20 obras) · Law (19 obras) · Ecology (15 obras)