James Acheson the 2004 winner of American Anthropological Association's award

Eurek Alert

University of Maine anthropology and marine sciences professor James Acheson has been named the 2004 winner of the American Anthropological Association's Kimball award for effecting change in public policy. Acheson will receive the Award at the association's annual meeting in San Francisco in November.

"In the past few years, my primary contribution has been to use 'rational choice theory' to show under what conditions groups of people will and will not develop rules to conserve the resources on which their livelihood depends," Acheson says. "This has led me into a far more theoretical realm – namely trying to understand the circumstances under which people develop rules in general."

Acheson has studied the system of self governance in the Maine lobster industry and has chronicled the circumstances under which lobster fishermen developed informal rules and lobbied for formal laws to conserve the lobster stock. >> continue

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James Acheson: Capturing the Commons (University Press of New England)