Creating Legal Teeth for Toothfish: Using the Market to Protect Fish Stocks in Antarctica

Policies to protect Antarctic and Patagonian Toothfish in theSouthern Ocean are failing. Contests over sovereignty, the needfor international decisions to be approved by consensus, inabilityto physically patrol the Southern Ocean, and the political vacuumcreated by the designation of the ‘high seas’ haveeach contributed to an overfishing crisis in the Southern Oceanand Antarctica. After documenting the contours of this fishingcrisis and explaining how international law is unable to preventit, this article proposes a fundamental shift in strategy awayfrom supply-side controls that require a presence in Antarcticawhere the overfishing occurs. Lawmakers must utilise more rigorousdemand-side measures if Toothfish stocks are to be preservedand allowed to recover.     

The Formal Divide: Customary Rights and the Allocation of Credit to Agriculture in Tanzania

It is generally held that one mechanism to enable inclusive growth in Tanzania is enabling farmers to access credit to raise productivity and incomes. The formalisation of property rights in Tanzania is being undertaken by a multiplicity of actors at great expense to donors, individuals and the government. While there have been a variety of different justifications for allocating Certificates of Customary Rights of Occupancy (CCROs) to farmers in Tanzania, perhaps the most prominent argument is that it will enable farmers to finally overcome the divide between ‘informal’ customary rights and the formal banking sector. CCROs would provide the collateral that would induce banks to lend money to small-scale farmers. As part of a six-year investigation in Manyara, Mbeya and Dodoma regions, our research team evaluated the impact of formalisation on farmers’ access to credit. The paper will present the results while pointing to the continuing institutional and market imperfections that perpetuate the formal divide.     

Political Choice, Public Policy, and Distributional Outcomes

I address the functioning of the U.S. governing system by analyzing distributional outcomes from 1947 to 2000. The key question is whether public policy influences distributional outcomes. The macropolitics model and power resource theory suggest that left policies should equalize the distribution of income. I utilize single equation error correction models to assess the impact of policy on income inequality through two mechanisms—market conditioning and redistribution. Since nearly every government action influences markets in some way, I examine policy in the aggregate rather than focusing only on policies explicitly designed to redistribute income. The analysis indicates that policy influences inequality through both mechanisms, with left policy producing more equality. The results are consistent with power resource theory and strongly support the macropolitics model. Furthermore, I find that market conditioning is as important as, and works in tandem with, explicit redistribution.     

TRENDS IN THE LOGIC OF POLICY INQUIRY: A COMPARISON OF APPROACHES AND A COMMENTARY

This paper provides an overview of trends in the logic of policy inquiry. It compares Harold Lasswell's view of the policy sciences with the applied social science approach articulated by James Coleman and revised into multiplism by Thomas Cook. Alternative approaches presented by Trudi Miller (design science) and Yvonna Lincoln and Egon Cuba (naturalistic inquiry) are also examined. Commonalities existing among them are identified.     

COMMENTARY ON TIPPINS AND WITTMANN'S "EMPIRICAL AND ETHICAL PROBLEMS WITH CUSTODY RECOMMENDATIONS:

Although in substantial agreement with Tippins and Wittmann's analysis, their call for a moratorium on the practice of custody evaluators making recommendations to the court does not solve the many problems that they have raised, and may have unintended consequences which place families at even greater risk. This commentary reflects our agreement with some of the authors' major points of contention, focuses on several points of disagreement, and suggests alternative remedies for the shortcomings and ethical problems described in child custody evaluations.