Common-Pool Resources and Their Roles Emerged from Emergency Responses in Fishing Villages in Japan - Focusing on Communal Responses on Abalone Collecting in Sanriku Region After the Great East Japan Earthquake

This paper discussed various collaborative responses to natural resource collection in fishing villages in the Sanriku region, Japan, which the Great East Japan Earthquake severely damaged. Coastal fisheries resources in Japan have been managed under a system of fishing rights, known as Territorial Use Rights of Fisheries (TURF), one kind of Common-Pool Resources (CPRs). Taking abalone, an important resource, as a case study, the paper reconsidered the actual situation of CPR in fishing villages and the role played by CPR as seen from the emergency responses. Focusing on the distribution method of proceeds from abalone, I took six fishing villages that showed three types of cooperation as case studies and clarified the background that made communal efforts possible and the local context in which different responses were chosen for each. The results showed that, based on the practice and norm of using marine resources for the benefit of the community, different responses were chosen depending on the complex factors such as post-disaster changes in the community (population decline and aging), the positioning of the local fishing industry, and the status of recovery, such as evacuation and securing boats. Some fishing villages, while operating jointly, limited the number of beneficiaries than before the disaster to protect the livelihoods of remote island communities and full-time fishers.