Or Will We Be Soon Be Eating This?

     Hi, my name is Clay, and I am a tuna addict. It's true. Even though I feel ripples of guilt every time, whether it's a tuna-fish sandwich or a translucent slice of maguro sashimi, I feel bad that I am contributing to the emptying of the oceans. Try though I may to block it out, I know that the bluefin tuna population is on the edge of collapse, the yellowfin is not far behind, and the entire range of ocean fishing stocks are badly depleted.

   Keep this up, and soon all we'll have on the menu is the appetizing fellow pictured above. He's a moonsnail, one of nearly 18,000 weird species discovered in a 10-year survey of the deep. I understand the polyps snaking off his body in all directions are particularly yummy when battered and fried. Mmmm-mmm!

    Unfortunately, even deep-sea monsters are vulnerable to the predations of man. As we strip-mine the upper oceans of their major life forms, we deprive the lower reaches of their food sources. Meantime, the rising surface temperatures are percolating down and causing environmental disruption in ecological webs that are fine tuned to an extremely hostile environment. When you live in a dark, cold desert under countless tons of water, making a living is tough enough without people screwing with the thermostat.

   Let's be honest with ourselves: present-day agreements to constrain fishing are unlikely to work. The oceans are the ideal setting for the tragedy of the commons. No one owns them, and even in those portions governments claim, legal limitations are easily and routinely evaded. Even governments that are party to the agreements often have little intention of enforcing them.

    Under the perverse economic logic of the commons, the closer to extinction a species like the bluefin tuna is pushed, the more hotly it is pursued. Its value goes up, and if you don't grab the last few, someone else will. Knowing that next year there may be none makes no difference to your incentives at all. Marine zoning may be the best idea out there, but for all the reasons cited above getting consensus on large ocean preserves and then enforcing them looks tough.

   Only effective global governance can prevent these catastrophic depletions of natural resources. If we get to the end of the century with civilization intact, it will be because we have figured out how to develop and live under global government. The Europeans seem to have made a start, but when you consider that the world's governments include mad dictators like Kim Jong-Il, Muammar Gaddafi, and  Robert Mugabe, as well as behind-the-throne powers likeVladimir "Ras" Putin, Goldman Sachs, and Mobil-Exxon, you can see that it's a long haul to get there. Add to that the wild fears that so many Americans have of any sort of internationalism, and it becomes an even more daunting challenge.

   But we have to face up to it. Otherwise, the only people you'll find are likely to find will resemble Mad Max -- living off earthworms and moonsnails. A fishy future, to be sure.