Great city, right? Everyone thinks that it is cool that I'm going and I should have a good time. But here is my schedule:
- Friday, 1:30 - 10:30: travel to SF
- Saturday, 8:00-5:30: attend American Fisheries Society Governing Board meeting
- Sunday, 2:00-4:00: Preside over part of AFS Socioeconomics Section meeting as president and then ... past-president(!)
- Monday 12:30 am - 2:00 pm: travel to Boone
There won't be much time to enjoy the trip (sob), especially with the AFS position on economic growth coming to a climax.
Warning: long post.
In the May issue of the AFS monthly magazine, Fisheries, is the draft policy statement on Economic Growth and Fish Conservation and my response. Here is the three page PDF: Fisheries_May_2007.pdf.
I was all set to enjoy Labor Day weekend in Boone, NC. But I received this email about a month ago (cc'd to the AFS President, Executive Director, etc.):
We 14 active members of the American Fisheries Society Socioeconomics Section (SES) (listed above) call your attention to the Resource Policy Committee’s report regarding the draft AFS policy statement on economic growth and fish conservation (2007 Fisheries 32(5): 252-254). We object to your published commentary because we believe that you took inappropriate liberty by submitting comments in capacity of the SES president and on behalf of the SES.
First, at the 2006 annual meeting, the SES approved a motion that, for purposes of providing input on the draft policy statement on economic growth, a group more representative of SES membership would be formed. This working group was to include a non-economist social scientist, at least one ecological economist, and no more than one neoclassical economist. Explicit in the preceding discussion and implicit in the motion itself is that any further input from the SES on the matter of the draft policy statement would come from these representatives, and not from you. (Several of us present at the meeting also recall your statement that you would not be issuing further input on this subject.)
In addition to your commentary in Fisheries, and also despite the SES motion, you state in the summer 2007 SES newsletter that you will be “taking the lead on the Section’s ongoing response to the economic growth issue”, which we believe is beyond the scope of your representative authority. Also, your written disclaimer that your “views are not representative of every member of the Socioeconomics Section” (emphasis added) implies that the vast majority of SES members hold these views, which is false. Clearly this statement is misleading to AFS members who have not been involved in this process and are unaware of the dynamics within the SES. Earlier attempts to obtain SES opinions on this subject were blocked, but our sense is that only a minority of SES members are opposed to the draft policy statement on economic growth. Finally, you wrote that “Whitehead is president of the AFS Socioeconomics Section”, which misrepresents your authority in commenting on behalf of SES. SES bylaws state that the president “shall serve for a period of one year or until a successor is duly elected.” Troy Hartley was elected SES president in the spring of 2006.
Although we have welcomed a healthy debate with a full range of opposing viewpoints and believe that every AFS member may and should comment on the economic growth issue, we ask that you refrain from further involvement with this issue while acting in the official capacity of SES representative. SES has had ample opportunity to weigh in on the draft position on economic growth, which should now be in the hands of the Resource Policy Committee. If the Resource Policy Committee requests further input from the SES, that input should come from the working group mentioned above, as was agreed upon by SES members at the annual meeting.
My response (to the entire section membership, about 125) set off an e-mail war within the section:
An issue within the section has recently arisen which I'd like to bring to your attention ....
First, please consider the email [above] which was written in response to my response to the "Economic Growth and Fish Conservation" draft policy statement from the AFS Resource Policy Committee (see page 252 in the May Fisheries magazine [http://www.fisheries.org/afs/publications/fisheriesmag/3205.pdf]).
...
I'd next like to address some key points raised in the email.
1. The authors of the email below claim that I "took inappropriate liberty by submitting comments in capacity of the SES president and on behalf of the SES."
I was asked to write the response on page 254 of the May Fisheries by the chair of the Resource Policy Committee and the current President of AFS. I agreed and made clear that "These views are not representative of every member of the Socioeconomics Section."
2. The authors of the email [above] point out that a motion was passed at the 2006 annual section meeting that "for purposes of providing input on the draft policy statement on economic growth, a group more representative of SES membership would be formed. This working group was to include a non-economist social scientist, at least one ecological economist, and no more than one neoclassical economist."
The Socioeconomics Section was not
beenasked to provide input on the draft policy statement after the 2006 Annual Meeting in Lake Placid. This was a suggestion from me, agreed to by .... The revised draft that begins on page 252 of the May Fisheries did not include any Socioeconomics Section input. As I reported in the summer 2007 Socioeconomics Section newsletter, as a Governing Board member I made a friendly amendment which I thought would make the draft policy statement more palatable to the AFS membership (see page 17 here: http://www.fisheries.org/units/socioecon/Newsletter/SE_Newsletter_Summer_2007.pdf). As I state above, I was specifically asked to write a response for the May Fisheries as president of the section with caveats about who I represented.3. The authors of the email [above] ask me to "refrain from further involvement with this issue while acting in the official capacity of SES representative."
I have no intention of honoring this request. I am completing my fourth year as president of the Socioeconomics Section which was preceded by several years of membership, a year as president-elect and I'm looking forward to a year as past-president. I have been the chief critic of the "economic growth and fish conservation" policy statement and to drop out of the process now at the request of 14 members of the Socioeconomics Section does not seem appropriate.
4. The authors of the email [above] write "you state in the summer 2007 SES newsletter that you will be 'taking the lead on the Section's ongoing response to the economic growth issue', which we believe is beyond the scope of your representative authority."
[SES] President-elect ... has asked that I take this lead so that he can focus on other matters for the section. I see nothing in the AFS Socioeconomics Section by-laws that limit the activities of the past-president as representative of the section.
5. The authors of the email [above] write "Finally, you wrote that 'Whitehead is president of the AFS Socioeconomics Section', which misrepresents your authority in commenting on behalf of SES. SES bylaws state that the president 'shall serve for a period of one year or until a successor is duly elected.' Troy Hartley was elected SES president in the spring of 2006."
[name] was elected to the office of president-elect in the spring of 2006. While I would have liked for him to take over the office of president immediately, we both agreed that the transition would be smoother if he served a year as president-elect so that he could observe the full range of duties of an AFS section president. As such, I am president of the socioeconomics section until the close of "old business" during the 2007 annual section meeting in San Francisco.
Finally, a letter to the editor was published in the most recent issue of Fisheries (September? I can't find the PDF):
Dear Editor,
As concerned members of the AFS Socioeconomics Section (SES), and in response to the comment of SES past-president John Whitehead in the May 2007 issue of Fisheries, we want to clarify our opinions on the draft AFS policy statement on economic growth and fish conservation.
First, we commend the AFS Governing Board and Resource Policy Committee (RPC) for presenting AFS members with the draft policy statement. Without the statements of professional natural resources societies regarding the impacts of economic growth on fish and wildlife, we allow politicians, economists, and business interests to have free reign over the issue. Far too often we’ve heard the results in the form of rhetoric such as, “There is no conflict between growing the economy and protecting the environment.” Such rhetoric has led to a wasteful consumer ethic and to macroeconomic policies resulting in the decline of aquatic ecosystems and fisheries, among other forms of environmental deterioration.
Given the contrasting underpinnings of orthodox (neoclassical) and heterodox (biophysical, ecological, etc.) economics, we accept the fact that consensus on every aspect of this issue is unattainable. Many of us want stronger wording about the inherent conflict between economic growth and fish conservation than appears in the RPC draft, and we have provided our suggestions through appropriate channels. An example is the role of microeconomic and macroeconomic policies in conserving fish and the ecosystems they depend upon. The draft policy statement calls for the application of microeconomic policy tools to what is, in the end, a macroeconomic matter: economic growth.
We recognize value in microeconomic policy reform for the sake of efficiently allocating resources, including fisheries. For that reason, especially, we have welcomed the contributions of neoclassical economists to fisheries management, and we can even accept a certain amount of microeconomic language in a policy statement on economic growth. However, tweaking microeconomics simply is not sufficient to effect the fundamental economic changes necessary to enhance fish conservation substantially. Expecting microeconomics alone to fix a macroeconomic problem is like arranging the china shop while letting in the bull. Therefore, we think the policy statement must address macroeconomic reform as well.
Dr. Whitehead’s disclaimer that his “views are not representative of every member of the Socioeconomics Section” (emphasis added) is correct, strictly speaking. However, this is misleading to the naïve reader, as it suggests that those who hold contrary views are a very small minority. To the contrary, we have found it quite easy to identify numerous SES supporters of the proposed policy statement. (The ten signatures on this letter represent the editorial limit.) Indeed, we believe that the majority of SES members would actually favor the policy statement advanced by the RPC, or else remain neutral on the subject. That said, an accurate opinion tally from the SES is no longer especially important. Rather, we believe it is time for the opinions of the RPC, Governing Board, and AFS membership at large to prevail, and not the opinion of the SES or a minority therein.
Neoclassical economists are well-known for advocating laissez-faire and economic growth. It is time for fisheries ecologists to weigh in on the impacts of economic growth on fish conservation - and what to do about it - rather than leaving this issue in the hands of neoclassical economists. Considering the mounting empirical evidence, coupled with official positions already taken by other professional societies (The Wildlife Society, American Society of Mammalogists, U.S. Society for Ecological Economics, and others), an AFS position on economic growth is long overdue. We believe the RPC’s draft statement is a good starting point, and look forward to constructive, thoughtful commentary from the rest of AFS regarding this important policy issue.
If I understand the process correctly, as the Governing Board gathers in San Francisco on September 1 there will be a vote on whether the "Economic Growth and Fish Conservation" Draft Policy Statement is "appropriate and scientifically justified." If the vote is in favor "the policy question and supporting documentation would be put before the membership for their concurrence." If the vote is against then something else happens (I'm not sure what).
If it gets to the point where I might say something at the Governing Board meeting in my role as representative of the Socioeconomics Section I'll say something like this:
Contractionary macroeconomic policy (decreased government spending, increased taxes, higher interest rates) is the wrong approach to improving fish conservation. Macroeconomic policy is a blunt instrument. As economic growth chills, there is no guarantee that the status of fisheries would improve. They might actually worsen if illegal pollution and overfishing is a response to the lack of economic opportunity elsewhere. Microeconomic policy (e.g., pollution taxes) can be used to improve water quality, fisheries and other environmental variables. This is not a pro-growth argument. Environmental policies put constraints on behavior and reduce economic growth (there is no win-win policy where environmental quality and incomes rise). I plan on voting against the RPC draft policy statement.
At night I pray: "Please god let this be over soon. I promise to tithe my net income as soon as it is over. Amen."
