Just Fish: Ethics and Canadian Marine Fisheries

by Harold Coward (Editor)

Today in Canada, the fish stocks of both the east and west coasts are in serious trouble. The once-great cod stocks have collapsed; the Fraser River salmon stocks seem to have done likewise. Coastal communities are in crisis. The majority of the great world fisheries are seriously over-exploited, and some bodies of water are effectively dead. The problem has to lie with the manner in which we run our fisheries. The issue is ethical as well as social and environmental.A team of humanists, natural scientists, and social scientists came together to examine the question of justice in the Canadian fisheries and to seek an ethical foundation upon which to base guidelines for fisheries policies and decision-making in the future. Just Fish, the result of their work, argues that Canada could - and must - become a world leader in developing fisheries management institutions that can protect the legitimate interests of both fish and the fishers who depend upon them.

304 pages, Paperback

Published April 4, 2000

About the author

Harold G. Coward is a professor emeritus of history and the founding director of the Centre for Studies in Religion and Society at the University of Victoria. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. He served as president of the Canadian Society for the Study of Religion and was the founding editor of the Journal for Hindu-Christian Studies and editor of the WLU Press series The Study of Religion in Canada. He has authored twenty books along with many edited books, chapters and articles. His publications include Scripture in the World Religions (2002), Mantra: Hearing the Divine in India and America (2004), and The Perfectibility of Human Nature in Eastern and Western Thought (2008).