The high seas are often characterized as the final and most challenging frontier of fisheries governance. Stock depletions and rent dissipation persist there despite the recovery of several fish stocks within exclusive economic zones. This article examines the legal institutions relevant to managing straddling and highly migratory fish stocks, focusing in particular on the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOs) and the UN Fish Stocks Agreement. It summarizes the evolution of the freedom to fish and explains how that freedom has frustrated efforts to address excess capitalization and stock depletion on the high seas. The article then describes the conditions under which a communal property framework, of the type envisioned in the UN Fish Stocks Agreement, could function for straddling and highly migratory fish stocks. Noting that these conditions are currently absent from most regional fisheries management organizations, the article concludes by outlining the options for collective and unilateral action to close the high seas commons.
{"title":"The Freedom to Fish: An Obsolete Institution Governing High Seas Fish Stocks","authors":"R. Watson","doi":"10.2139/SSRN.2229897","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/SSRN.2229897","url":null,"abstract":"The high seas are often characterized as the final and most challenging frontier of fisheries governance. Stock depletions and rent dissipation persist there despite the recovery of several fish stocks within exclusive economic zones. This article examines the legal institutions relevant to managing straddling and highly migratory fish stocks, focusing in particular on the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOs) and the UN Fish Stocks Agreement. It summarizes the evolution of the freedom to fish and explains how that freedom has frustrated efforts to address excess capitalization and stock depletion on the high seas. The article then describes the conditions under which a communal property framework, of the type envisioned in the UN Fish Stocks Agreement, could function for straddling and highly migratory fish stocks. Noting that these conditions are currently absent from most regional fisheries management organizations, the article concludes by outlining the options for collective and unilateral action to close the high seas commons.","PeriodicalId":103541,"journal":{"name":"Property & Environment Research Center (PERC) Research Paper Series","volume":"20 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2013-03-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"134061370","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
A basic moral hazard problem has potential to avoid socially beneficial development of natural resources. Various financial assurance mechanisms have evolved to satisfy regulatory requirements for credible environmental protection. But recent macroeconomic and financial market developments have increased the cost of financial assurance. In addition, traditional methods of financial assurance may be inappropriate for addressing long-term risks to water quality, an issue of growing concern. Revised collateral requirements along with explicit capital safety standards can reduce the cost of long-term financial assurance for environmental protection and reclamation by enabling resource developers to exploit the benefits of portfolio diversification. These policy proposals may be particularly beneficial in less-developed institutional regimes, where enforcement is less effective and costly regulation is more likely to result in unsanctioned exploitation.
{"title":"Financial Assurance for Environmental Protection: Trends and Opportunities","authors":"Michael J. Orlando","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.2141337","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2141337","url":null,"abstract":"A basic moral hazard problem has potential to avoid socially beneficial development of natural resources. Various financial assurance mechanisms have evolved to satisfy regulatory requirements for credible environmental protection. But recent macroeconomic and financial market developments have increased the cost of financial assurance. In addition, traditional methods of financial assurance may be inappropriate for addressing long-term risks to water quality, an issue of growing concern. Revised collateral requirements along with explicit capital safety standards can reduce the cost of long-term financial assurance for environmental protection and reclamation by enabling resource developers to exploit the benefits of portfolio diversification. These policy proposals may be particularly beneficial in less-developed institutional regimes, where enforcement is less effective and costly regulation is more likely to result in unsanctioned exploitation.","PeriodicalId":103541,"journal":{"name":"Property & Environment Research Center (PERC) Research Paper Series","volume":"6 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2012-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"122272804","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Why are some societies characterized by enduring democracy, while other societies are either persistently autocratic or experiment with democracy but then quickly fall back into autocracy? I find that there is a systematic, non-linear relationship between rainfall levels, human capital, property rights institutions and regime types such that stable democracies overwhelmingly cluster in a band of moderate rainfall (540 to 1200 mm of precipitation per year). I advance a theory to explain this outcome that focuses on how differences in the crops that could be grown in different rainfall bands affected societies’ institutional paths of development. I then test that theory against a unique cross-country dataset, a comparison of democracies and autocracies in antiquity, and a series of natural experiments.This paper builds upon an earlier collaboration with Victor Menaldo (University of Washington). Our joint paper, “Rainfall, Human Capital, and Democracy,” is available on SSRN. I also gratefully acknowledge discussions with Ran Abramitzky, Isa Chavez, Roy Elis, Stanley Engerman, Rob Fleck, Avner Greif, Tim Guinnane, Mark Kleinman, Dorothy Kronick, Naomi Lamoreaux, Ross Levine, Joseph Manning, Ian Morris, Josh Ober, Robert Packenham, Paul Sniderman, William Summerhill, and Barry Weingast. Nicholas Baldo, Kevin Cook, Roy Elis, Anne Given, and Scott Khamphoune, Dorothy Kronick, and Cole Lupoli, provided invaluable research assistance.
为什么有些社会的特点是持久的民主，而另一些社会要么是持续的专制，要么是民主的实验，但很快就会回落到专制?我发现降雨量、人力资本、产权制度和政权类型之间存在着系统的非线性关系，因此稳定的民主国家绝大多数都集中在中等降雨量(每年降水量540至1200毫米)的范围内。我提出了一个理论来解释这一结果，该理论的重点是在不同雨带种植的作物的差异如何影响社会的制度发展路径。然后，我用一个独特的跨国数据集、古代民主政体和专制政体的比较，以及一系列自然实验来检验这一理论。这篇论文建立在与Victor Menaldo(华盛顿大学)早期合作的基础上。我们的联合论文《降雨、人力资本和民主》可在社会科学网(SSRN)上找到。我还要感谢与兰·阿布拉米茨基、伊萨·查韦斯、罗伊·埃利斯、斯坦利·英格曼、罗布·弗莱克、阿夫纳·格雷夫、蒂姆·金纳恩、马克·克莱曼、多萝西·克罗尼克、娜奥米·拉莫罗克斯、罗斯·莱文、约瑟夫·曼宁、伊恩·莫里斯、乔希·奥伯、罗伯特·帕克南姆、保罗·斯奈德曼、威廉·夏山和巴里·温加斯特的讨论。Nicholas Baldo, Kevin Cook, Roy Elis, Anne Given, Scott Khamphoune, Dorothy Kronick和Cole Lupoli提供了宝贵的研究援助。
{"title":"Climate, Technology, and the Evolution of Economic and Political Institutions","authors":"S. Haber","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.2042669","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2042669","url":null,"abstract":"Why are some societies characterized by enduring democracy, while other societies are either persistently autocratic or experiment with democracy but then quickly fall back into autocracy? I find that there is a systematic, non-linear relationship between rainfall levels, human capital, property rights institutions and regime types such that stable democracies overwhelmingly cluster in a band of moderate rainfall (540 to 1200 mm of precipitation per year). I advance a theory to explain this outcome that focuses on how differences in the crops that could be grown in different rainfall bands affected societies’ institutional paths of development. I then test that theory against a unique cross-country dataset, a comparison of democracies and autocracies in antiquity, and a series of natural experiments.This paper builds upon an earlier collaboration with Victor Menaldo (University of Washington). Our joint paper, “Rainfall, Human Capital, and Democracy,” is available on SSRN. I also gratefully acknowledge discussions with Ran Abramitzky, Isa Chavez, Roy Elis, Stanley Engerman, Rob Fleck, Avner Greif, Tim Guinnane, Mark Kleinman, Dorothy Kronick, Naomi Lamoreaux, Ross Levine, Joseph Manning, Ian Morris, Josh Ober, Robert Packenham, Paul Sniderman, William Summerhill, and Barry Weingast. Nicholas Baldo, Kevin Cook, Roy Elis, Anne Given, and Scott Khamphoune, Dorothy Kronick, and Cole Lupoli, provided invaluable research assistance.","PeriodicalId":103541,"journal":{"name":"Property & Environment Research Center (PERC) Research Paper Series","volume":"54 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2012-04-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"123095785","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Historians of economics have paid minimal attention to the diffusion of economic ideas in the textbook literature. Given the low esteem in which textbooks are held as embodiments of scholarship and the propensity of historians of economics - and intellectual historians generally - to focus on the production of scholarship through more lofty venues such as journal articles and scholarly books, this lack of attention to the textbook literature is in some ways understandable. This article argues that the textbook literature constitutes an incredibly rich data source for the historian of economics. In doing so, it offers illustrations from the treatment of the Coase theorem in the textbooks, with a view both to showing how the textbook literature enhances our understanding of the diffusion of economic ideas and how attempts by authors to grapple with new ideas in the context of the textbook literature can result in divergences between how these ideas are treated in the scholarly and textbook literatures.
{"title":"Textbooks as Data for the Study of the History of Economics: Lowly Beast or Fruitful Vineyard?","authors":"Steven G. Medema","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.1926360","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1926360","url":null,"abstract":"Historians of economics have paid minimal attention to the diffusion of economic ideas in the textbook literature. Given the low esteem in which textbooks are held as embodiments of scholarship and the propensity of historians of economics - and intellectual historians generally - to focus on the production of scholarship through more lofty venues such as journal articles and scholarly books, this lack of attention to the textbook literature is in some ways understandable. This article argues that the textbook literature constitutes an incredibly rich data source for the historian of economics. In doing so, it offers illustrations from the treatment of the Coase theorem in the textbooks, with a view both to showing how the textbook literature enhances our understanding of the diffusion of economic ideas and how attempts by authors to grapple with new ideas in the context of the textbook literature can result in divergences between how these ideas are treated in the scholarly and textbook literatures.","PeriodicalId":103541,"journal":{"name":"Property & Environment Research Center (PERC) Research Paper Series","volume":"241 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2011-09-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121869517","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Biomass, a renewable energy source, has been viewed as “carbon neutral”—that is, its use as energy is presumed not to release net carbon dioxide. However, this assumption of carbon neutrality has recently been challenged. In 2010 two letters were sent to the Congress by eminent scientists examining the merits—or demerits—of biomass for climate change mitigation. The first, from about 90 scientists (to Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, from W.H. Schlesinger et al. May 17, 2010), questioned the treatment of all biomass energy as carbon neutral, arguing that it could undermine legislative emissions reduction goals. The second letter, submitted by more than 100 forest scientists (to Barbara Boxer et al. from Bruce Lippke et al. July 20, 2010), expressed concern over equating biogenic carbon emissions with fossil fuel emissions, as is contemplated in the Environmental Protection Agency’s Tailoring Rule. It argued that an approach focused on smokestack emissions, independent of the feedstocks, would encourage further fossil fuel energy production, to the long-term detriment of the atmosphere. This paper attempts to clarify and, to the extent possible, resolve these differences.
{"title":"Carbon Neutrality and Bioenergy: A Zero-Sum Game?","authors":"R. Sedjo","doi":"10.2139/SSRN.1808080","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/SSRN.1808080","url":null,"abstract":"Biomass, a renewable energy source, has been viewed as “carbon neutral”—that is, its use as energy is presumed not to release net carbon dioxide. However, this assumption of carbon neutrality has recently been challenged. In 2010 two letters were sent to the Congress by eminent scientists examining the merits—or demerits—of biomass for climate change mitigation. The first, from about 90 scientists (to Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, from W.H. Schlesinger et al. May 17, 2010), questioned the treatment of all biomass energy as carbon neutral, arguing that it could undermine legislative emissions reduction goals. The second letter, submitted by more than 100 forest scientists (to Barbara Boxer et al. from Bruce Lippke et al. July 20, 2010), expressed concern over equating biogenic carbon emissions with fossil fuel emissions, as is contemplated in the Environmental Protection Agency’s Tailoring Rule. It argued that an approach focused on smokestack emissions, independent of the feedstocks, would encourage further fossil fuel energy production, to the long-term detriment of the atmosphere. This paper attempts to clarify and, to the extent possible, resolve these differences.","PeriodicalId":103541,"journal":{"name":"Property & Environment Research Center (PERC) Research Paper Series","volume":"1 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2011-04-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"133337464","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
We show that grandfathering fishing rights to local users or recognizing first possessions is more dynamically efficient than auctions of such rights. It is often argued that auctions allocate rights to the highest-valued users and thereby maximize resource rents. We counter that rents are not fixed in situ but rather depend additionally upon the innovation, investment, and collective actions of fishers, who discover and enhance stocks and convert them into valuable goods and services. Our analysis shows how grandfathering increases rents by raising expected rates of return for investment, lowering the cost of capital, and providing incentives for collective action.
{"title":"Efficiency Advantages of Grandfathering in Rights-Based Fisheries Management","authors":"G. Libecap, R. Arnason, T. Anderson","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.1740455","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1740455","url":null,"abstract":"We show that grandfathering fishing rights to local users or recognizing first possessions is more dynamically efficient than auctions of such rights. It is often argued that auctions allocate rights to the highest-valued users and thereby maximize resource rents. We counter that rents are not fixed in situ but rather depend additionally upon the innovation, investment, and collective actions of fishers, who discover and enhance stocks and convert them into valuable goods and services. Our analysis shows how grandfathering increases rents by raising expected rates of return for investment, lowering the cost of capital, and providing incentives for collective action.","PeriodicalId":103541,"journal":{"name":"Property & Environment Research Center (PERC) Research Paper Series","volume":"19 10","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2010-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"132609618","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Modern naval warfare is the exclusive province of government. Until relatively recently, however, governments tolerated — even encouraged — private sector participation in maritime hostilities. Naval and merchant vessels were not strongly differentiated from one another, and neither type of vessel was well suited to all-weather, year-round duty at sea. When combined with rudimentary (and relatively costly) systems of taxation, this gave monarchs an incentive to focus their naval ventures during good weather months and to rely on merchant ships as important supplements to the Crown’s navy. Thus, until the eighteenth century, privately owned and operated merchant vessels were used as men-of-war, and they served in the war on enemy trade into the nineteenth century. We seek to explain the observed variation in the key contractual provisions of privateer contracts by examining over 60 contracts from the period 1744 to 1807, gathered from the files of the Public Record Office in London. We suggest reasons for many of the general patterns seen in the contracts; notably, we believe we have a remarkably simple yet powerful explanation for the enormous variation observed in the distribution of the prizes between the owners and crew. We also provide a clearer picture of the variation in the distribution of prize shares among crew members, using measures of inequality to compare different privateers’ allotments. Most importantly, we have developed a method of using contractual provisions to infer the expectations of privateers regarding the prizes they were likely to capture. We are then able to use these estimates to infer expected total earnings of seafarers at all levels of the chain of command. One implication of these estimates is that crew serving on privateers could expect to earn substantially more than men serving on merchant ships. For able seamen the privateering premium was at least fifty percent; for higher ranks it likely was even greater.
{"title":"Private Warfare in the Age of Sail","authors":"Daniel K. Benjamin, D. Macaulay","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.2328968","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2328968","url":null,"abstract":"Modern naval warfare is the exclusive province of government. Until relatively recently, however, governments tolerated — even encouraged — private sector participation in maritime hostilities. Naval and merchant vessels were not strongly differentiated from one another, and neither type of vessel was well suited to all-weather, year-round duty at sea. When combined with rudimentary (and relatively costly) systems of taxation, this gave monarchs an incentive to focus their naval ventures during good weather months and to rely on merchant ships as important supplements to the Crown’s navy. Thus, until the eighteenth century, privately owned and operated merchant vessels were used as men-of-war, and they served in the war on enemy trade into the nineteenth century. We seek to explain the observed variation in the key contractual provisions of privateer contracts by examining over 60 contracts from the period 1744 to 1807, gathered from the files of the Public Record Office in London. We suggest reasons for many of the general patterns seen in the contracts; notably, we believe we have a remarkably simple yet powerful explanation for the enormous variation observed in the distribution of the prizes between the owners and crew. We also provide a clearer picture of the variation in the distribution of prize shares among crew members, using measures of inequality to compare different privateers’ allotments. Most importantly, we have developed a method of using contractual provisions to infer the expectations of privateers regarding the prizes they were likely to capture. We are then able to use these estimates to infer expected total earnings of seafarers at all levels of the chain of command. One implication of these estimates is that crew serving on privateers could expect to earn substantially more than men serving on merchant ships. For able seamen the privateering premium was at least fifty percent; for higher ranks it likely was even greater.","PeriodicalId":103541,"journal":{"name":"Property & Environment Research Center (PERC) Research Paper Series","volume":"179 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2003-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"116164680","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Policy makers are often interested in how values for an environmental asset may be disaggregated into component pieces and transferred from one site to another. This issue can be described in relation to environmental values for the Fitzroy basin in Central Queensland. It comprises several smaller catchments that share similar development opportunities, environmental issues and water resource constraints. This paper describes the application of a choice modelling experiment to estimate values for the basin as a whole and two of the smaller catchments. The results of the application allow the analysts to determine how the values Calculated at different times may be related. If there are no significant differences in values according to the scale at which they have been estimated, it implies that benefit transfer may be undertaken to different sites at different scales without results being adjusted. Comparisons of experiment results are undertaken to assess the validity of the choice modelling approach to benefit transfer in environmental valuation studies where issues of scale may be present.
{"title":"Scale Effects and Their Importance for Benefit Transfers of Natural Resource Values in the Fitzroy Basin, Research Report No. 6","authors":"A. Loch, J. Rolfe, J. Bennett","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.1440625","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1440625","url":null,"abstract":"Policy makers are often interested in how values for an environmental asset may be disaggregated into component pieces and transferred from one site to another. This issue can be described in relation to environmental values for the Fitzroy basin in Central Queensland. It comprises several smaller catchments that share similar development opportunities, environmental issues and water resource constraints. This paper describes the application of a choice modelling experiment to estimate values for the basin as a whole and two of the smaller catchments. The results of the application allow the analysts to determine how the values Calculated at different times may be related. If there are no significant differences in values according to the scale at which they have been estimated, it implies that benefit transfer may be undertaken to different sites at different scales without results being adjusted. Comparisons of experiment results are undertaken to assess the validity of the choice modelling approach to benefit transfer in environmental valuation studies where issues of scale may be present.","PeriodicalId":103541,"journal":{"name":"Property & Environment Research Center (PERC) Research Paper Series","volume":"15 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2002-06-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"114419189","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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