Where's the Humanity? A Challenge and Opportunity for the Fisheries Community

The authors submit that the professional fisheries science community has failed to embrace and utilize fully the social sciences in the study and management of fisheries. A review of principal fisheries literature in recent years suggests that little attention is being given to the human parameters of fisheries. The authors restate and reaffirm some basic tenets pertaining to the importance of people's needs, values, and perceptions in any general resource management system and, more specifically, in fisheries resource development. The university is viewed as both contributor to the problem of the overlooked human component in fisheries study and as one important agent for addressing this shortcoming in the future. Lastly, it is offered that today's fishery managers can also help to remedy the shortfall in the use and appreciation of social analyses in fisheries work. This can be done through greater receptivity among managers for social science research results, and through efforts to legitimize the social sciences in the minds and professional development of managers of the future. A number of suggestions are made that might improve the acceptance and use of “human sciences” by fisheries professionals.