Neither Fish Nor Fowl: Navigating Motivations for Fisheries Participation and Exit in Sweden
Milena Arias Schreiber, Maris Boyd Gillette
Abstract
Fisheries’ supply of ecosystem services depends on recruiting, maintaining and—in cases of overfishing—preventing fishers’ participation. Participation is influenced by fishers’ levels of job satisfaction and a variety of motivations that cannot be reduced to income size. Previous research on fishers’ job satisfaction has applied Maslow’s hierarchy of basic, socio-psychological and self-actualization needs. Using these as three categories of co-existing rather than hierarchical needs, we investigate Swedish fishers’ motivations for considering fisheries exit. Our results suggest that more than half of fishers are considering exiting and that they identify conflicts with seals (31%), environmental policies (17%) and performance of government agencies (16%) as their main reasons. These motivations, we argue, impact simultaneously basic, socio-psychological and self-actualization needs. Accordingly, fishers’ motivations for participation-exit decisions are not solely, and may not be primarily, monetary. A better understanding of fishers’ motivations, particularly non-monetary ones, would improve fisheries management.