Jts: (don't take offense of the piece below, as I am not saying you said anything related)

Some folks claim that the solution to the "tragedy of the commons" is more private ownership of the resource and fewer fishermen. Most areas have fewer fishermen, and unfortunately less economic spin off to local communities, once relying on the local fish resource. Those who remain, face high costs, to maintain common services. Added to this are ITQs, which allow fishermen to sell and concentrate these resource to corporate interests.Some folks are lucky to get jobs as "hands" fishing the resource their grandparents used to have a share of. Some areas do not allow concentration of the resourcers into the hands of a few. Some have made moves to shared local "community quotas", based on catch history. (This is something we should discuss in more detail later, if you are interested)

As to the conservation benefits a few (for example, corporations) controlling the resource, look what happened to the fish off northern Nfld. (with a early form of ITQs,involving a very few corporate interests). It was not the fishermen you mentioned, operating the boats who made the decisions to "keep fishing and dump massive amounts of fish overboard" (with obvious impact on the local communties they lived in). It was the people in the "far away" corporate offices, who had more concern for filling today's fish orders, rather than conserving tomorrows resource.

Maybe the "local folks" would not have done better if in control, maybe they would have? But, what happened is a poor reason fora conclusion that a scenario with fewer (corporate) owners make more sense for conserving the fish resources. - note I am not saying that you said that, jts)

Maybe this deserves a thread of it's own, as I am sure we could discuss it in a more focused way, without taking away from the OP?