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Title: Commercial Fisching Livelihoods, Permit Loss, and the Next Generation in Bristol Bay, Alaska

Citation Type: Dissertation/Thesis

Publication Year: 2019

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Abstract: Fishing people across the globe have experienced a fundamental restructuring of their livelihoods, commw1ities, and economies as the result of shifts to rights-based fisheries management in the past half­cenrury. The ideological underpinnings of this movement are based in neoliberalism, which is a belief system that values individualism, competition, private property, and govemance by the free market. I examine some of the long-term and latem effect of this and other significant historical transitions in the fishery-<lependent Bristol Bay region of Alaska. Relationships between humans and salmon in Bristol Bay evolved over thousands of years and inform the way that many fishing livelihoods are pursued today. In addition to these fow1dational relationships, man}' significant changes have occurred that have shocked and stressed the livelihood "fabric'' woven many interlocking threads (i.e., the sociocultural, economic, knowledge/skill, political, natural, physical building blocks needed to construct a fishing livelihood in the region). lnfonned by literature review and ethnography, I describe in detail four such changes: colonization of Bristol Bay's Indigenous peoples, industrialization of the commercial fishery, implementation of a rights-based access regime (i.e., limited entry pennit program), and the sockeye salmon price crash of the early 2000s. These effects linger today and raise questions for the future of the Bay and its fisheries, with respect to two particular issues: the ,uicertainty around the next generation of fishem1e11, and the severe loss of locally held pennits in the Bay. To address d1e former, I conducted a survey of local students to measure their perceptions of the fishing industry and of community life. The results of this survey suggest that familial fishing ties, experience in die fishery, subsistence fishing activity, and household economic dependence on commercial fishing income are strong predictors of a student's desire to be engaged in commercial fishing as an adult. I examine the second issue-the loss of locally held fishing rights since the implementation of limited entry-through the combined analysis of qualitative ethnographic data and quantitative data on commercial fishery pen11it holdings, subsistence activity, pennit holder age, and new entry trends by community and residence category. The immense loss of limited entry pem1its continues to challenge livelihoods because access to local fisheries is the foundation of not only the region's economy, but also of the shared identity, history, and culture of local people, family and social networks, and the mechanism by which fislting knowledge, skills, values, and ethics are transferred to the next generation. I suggest that policymakers and fishery managers dispense with neoliberal panaceas, and design fisheries policies that reflect the multiplicity ofworldviews held by the policy's target populations by diversifying their own means and methods for understanding fishery systems.

Url: https://search.proquest.com/docview/2288901086?pq-origsite=gscholar

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Authors: Coleman, Jesse, M

Institution: University of Alaska, Fairbanks

Department: Fisheries

Advisor: Courtney Carothers

Degree: PhD

Publisher Location: Alaska

Pages: 195

Data Collections: IPUMS NHGIS

Topics: Natural Resource Management

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