Photo of Courtney Carothers

Contact Information

Fisheries Academic Program
207B O'Neill
PO Box 757220
University of Alaska Fairbanks
Fairbanks, AK 99775
Phone: (907) 474-5329
clcarothers@alaska.edu

Courtney Carothers Assistant Professor

Commercial Fisheries • Community Development • Fisheries Human Dimensions • Fishery Management

Specialties

Environmental Anthropology
Political Ecology
Marine Policy
Fishing Communities

Education

B.A. 2000 Cornell University (Biology and Society)
M.A. 2004 University of Washington (Anthropology)
Ph.D. 2008 University of Washington (Anthropology)

Courses

Research Overview

My research explores the social and political dimensions of fisheries and marine policy. My areas of interest include: processes of marine enclosure, e.g. individual fishing quotas, marine protected areas; local and traditional knowledge; science and technology studies; and socio-ecological change.

As a new faculty member in the School of Fisheries and Ocean Sciences, I am developing a research program to explore restricted access fisheries management and social change in Alaskan communities. As part of that effort, I am initiating an oral history project with fishermen in the Kodiak Archipelago to document trends of dramatically declining fisheries participation. I am also conducting research to explore the concepts of resilience and vulnerability as they relate to fishery systems and fishing communities in the Gulf of Alaska.

In addition, I am collaborating on several projects, including:

1. Collecting socioeconomic baseline and mapping resource use areas to monitor the impacts of a recently established network of marine protected areas along the California coast

2. Documenting the history and current dynamics of the pelagic handline fisheries in the Main Hawaiian Islands

3. Analyzing social and geographic fish distribution and sharing networks on O'ahu

4. Surveying the social impacts of major oil spill litigation in Alaska.

Current Research Projects

Subsistence Use and Knowledge of Beaufort Sea Salmon Populations (Minerals Management Service)
The designation of the entire Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) of the Beaufort Sea as Essential Fish Habitat for Pacific salmon populations combined with local observations of increasing numbers of salmon in subsistence fisheries has generated a need for more information about salmon use, distribution, and survival in the North Slope region. This study will address this knowledge gap by synthesizing relevant research and conducting ethnographic fieldwork with Inupiat informants about changing salmon populations. This study will provide a better understanding of the human and ecological environments that could be potentially affected by offshore oil and gas development in the Beaufort Sea. This study will document the historic and current importance of salmon as a subsistence resource and will also contextualize salmon among the suite of subsistence resources in this region. The specific objectives of this project are to: (1)Establish strong rapport with local community residents and regional experts. (2)Document the current subsistence use of Beaufort Sea salmon populations in Barrow, Nuiqsut, and Kaktovik or Atqasuk. (3)Document the local and traditional ecological knowledge of historic and recent trends in salmon use, abundance, and distribution. (4)Better understand the Inupiat context for ecological observations and appropriate uses of such knowledge. (5)Use spatial and ethnographic data to identify steams and coastal areas where salmon have been harvested or observed.
Exploring Fishing Community and Fishery System Resilience and Sustainability in the Gulf of Alaska (Alaska EPSCoR)
Processes of marine enclosure are radically shifting ocean governance across the globe (Lowe and Carothers 2008). My dissertation research tells the story of Alutiiq fishing communities that struggle to maintain even minimal involvement in commercial fishing. For over 7,000 years the people of the Kodiak Archipelago have made their living almost entirely from the sea. In recent years, these continuities have been challenged. Within the last generation participation in commercial fishing has dropped from nearly 90% to less than 30% in Kodiak fishing villages, particularly among Alaska Native and low-income fishing families (Carothers 2008). While the reasons for these declines are complex, local people identify the privatization – the individualization and commodification – of fishing rights as the primary factor that has brought about these alarming trends. My research focuses on issues of access and distributive justice in the management of marine resources. A deeper understanding of how and why demographic, cultural, and community-based factors affect the impacts of policies is necessary to design more equitable programs. In the case of small, remote fishing villages in the Gulf of Alaska, the regulatory environment has had dramatic impacts on the ability of local fishermen to respond to changing ecological and economic conditions. In the North Pacific and Alaska fisheries, scientific and management efforts focused on ensuring the ecological sustainability of fish stocks have often overlooked the importance of the sustainability of human fishing communities. I am developing a new research program to build on my previous studies of privatized fishing rights to explore larger questions of fishing community and fishery system sustainability in the Gulf of Alaska region. This research will explore the following questions: 1. What factors are necessary to promote the sustainability of rural fishing communities in the Gulf of Alaska? 2. How have ecological, economic, and regulatory changes been experienced across different human groups that participate in fishery systems? 3. What are the relationship between regulatory mechanisms, fishery participant behaviors, and the ecological conditions of managed fish stocks? 4. What strategies are small-scale fishermen and related participants utilizing that enables them to remain active in increasingly restrictive and competitive environments? 5. What new models of institutional and ecological management would provide for the resilience and adaptability of fishing-dependent communities?

Publications

Carothers, C., D. Lew and J. Sepez. (In review). Fishing rights and small communities: Alaska halibut quota transfer patterns. Ocean and Coastal Management.

Carothers, C. 2009. Tragedy of commodification: Transitions in Alutiiq fishing communities in Alaska. Proceedings of MARE People of the Sea V, University of Amsterdam Press, Amsterdam.

Carothers, C. 2009. Catch shares and conservation: Exploring community sustainability as a missing link. International Marine Conservation Congress Proceedings. All Academics Inc.

Glazier, E., J. Shackeroff, C. Carothers, J. Stevens, and R. Scalf. 2009. A Report on Historic and Contemporary Patterns of Change in Hawaiʻi-Based Pelagic Handline Fishing Operations—Final Report. A Publication of the Pelagic Fisheries Research Program Publication, Joint Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Research, University of Hawaii at Manoa. Honolulu.

Lowe, M. and C. Carothers, editors. 2008. Enclosing the Fisheries: People, Places, and Power. American Fisheries Society, Symposium 69, Bethesda, MD.

Carothers, C. 2008. “Rationalized out:” Discourses and realities of fisheries privatization in Kodiak, Alaska.In Lowe, M. and C. Carothers (editors). Enclosing the Fisheries: People, Places, and Power. American Fisheries Society , Symposium 69, Bethesda, MD.

Carothers, C. 2007. Impacts of halibut IFQs and changing Kodiak communities. In Cullenberg, Paula (ed) Harvesting the future: Alaska’s fishing communities, Alaska Sea Grant College Program, Fairbanks, AK.

Carothers, C. and J. Sepez. 2005. Commercial fishing crew demographics and trends in the North Pacific: 1993-2003. Managing fisheries, empowering communities, Alaska Sea Grant College Program, Fairbanks, AK.

Pimentel D., R. Doughty, C. Carothers, S. Lamberson, N. Bora, and K. Lee. 2003. Energy inputs in crop production in developing and developed countries. In Food Security & Environmental Quality in the Developing World. In Lal, R., D. Hansen, N. Uphoff, and S. Slack (editors), CRC Press.