Thirty-nine years after the first United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea and thirteen years after the historic meeting of Montego Bay (Jamaica), Nations still discuss and negotiate the order and management of Fisheries and the High Seas. Feasible restrictive measures are being discussed for limiting free access, licensable fishing systems and other administrative procedures, but with an intergovernmental character. Regional fishing organizations will possibly be commissioned for monitoring the fulfillment of these procedures and to recommend multilateral sanctions to the countries, pursuant to the obligations under established International Law and the World Trade Organization (WTO). 

Mc Luhan Global Village concept has put in evidence the tragedy and complexity of managing the so-called common goods of humanity. 

Until a few years ago, many countries perceived high seas fishing as an activity in nobody's waters because there were no practical, legal limitations and the perceived impossibility of nations controlling the activities of the fishing overseas fleets and the unlimited, endless expanse of the oceans. The depletion has occurred mostly in developed Nation's domestic waters, within their 200-mile zone, and it will probably repeat itself in the High Seas if we do not examine our past mistakes. 

The misconceptions that have driven the world to deplete many coastal fisheries, with predictable economic, social, political and environmental consequences, have created a global concern about mankind's future actions to stop it in time. 

While free-access has stimulated the traditional model that a fish that is not captured by one fisherman can be captured by another, the tragic reality began to be exposed in the 40s decade, when the importance and behavior of the so-called highly migratory species was known, with little uncertainty. 

The situation promoted the creation of a series of intergovernmental scientific fishing organizations, devoted to recommend quotas for maximum and optimum sustainable yield of certain fisheries as well as the status and dynamics of the populations and recommendation of administration and conservation measures. These organizations, that operate under areas and fisheries criteria, enjoyed the political and economic support of many nations during several decades. For example, we have the International Whaling Commission and the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission that handle cetaceans and tunas, respectively. However, as the catch effort in the high seas was not - at that time - meaningful and since many fisheries were found underexploited, many countries began to abandon these organizations under the argument that research was costly and unnecessary. 
 
The accelerated increase of the world population, together with the growth and the new technology of the fishing fleets, changed this situation radically with an increasing demand for fishing products and, consequently, the fishing effort. At this time, there is serious evidence that indicates high levels of over-fishing in some areas of the planet. Overfishing, according to some economists, would reduce the competitiveness of some fleets and thus, affecting their profitability and, therefore, the size of the fleet, bringing ecological equilibrium. However, fleets operating under governments subsidies and delay market mechanisms, would not permit the recovery of the resource, thus, bringing it into commercial extinction. 

In 1993 the world's fish catch, estimate in 100 million of tons, represented 70 billion US dollars. 
 
The infrastructure investment, according to FAO's estimates, to accomplish that catch --not including capital investments-- was calculated in 100 billion US dollars. This indicates that there is an annual world subsidy of 30 billion dollars, in order to maintain operating fleets that are inefficient and anti-economic. It is evident that economically, a fleet can be maintained, by government's deep pockets, in operations beyond the commercial collapse of a fishery. This reality has obligated the United Nations, and many countries that participate in the high seas fishing, to revise their political policies in international waters. 
 
Thus, the aspect of ecological sustainability has not been the only preoccupation element in international meetings. Consideration has also been given to the serious economic losses that can emerge with the collapse of a fishery, with immediate political and social consequences. Recently, a new element has appeared, as an important topic of discussion before international forums: animal rights; and with it, all the ideologies that cover all possible ecological variations, from the most moderate to the most radical. This new element, placed on the authorities in charge of managing and administration of fisheries, forces them to find a delicate balance between science and ideologies, provoking an international public opinion reactions guided to satisfy the demands of the civil society. The whaling issue, as an example, is no longer a cultural, sustainable use or basic food issue it is about giving whales the holy status of western sacred cows, because animal rights groups have formed the collective conscience of the public opinion into believing that these animals are more human than humans. 
 
Nonetheless, the stability of a new World Oceanic Order rests on the four metaphorical legs of this table: Science, Governments, Non-Governmental Organizations and Industry. If one of the legs is missing, the table will remain unstable. 
 
From the foregoing discussion, the idea of Responsible Fishing emerges. This concept was formalized during the International Conference for Responsible Fishing, celebrated in Mexico in 1992, from where the Cancun Declaration arose. The United Nations, through FAO, established the International Code of Conduct for Responsible Fishing, which conciliates the economic, ecological and social aspects of fishing with the moral and ethical ones. The Tuna-Dolphin and the Shrimp-Sea Turtle controversies are illustrative of these issues. 
 
Somehow, the current situation of the oceans and its live resources remains in the renowned Agenda 21 of the Conference of Rio, and this compels Nations to revise the following concepts: maximum Sustainable Yield, Optimum Sustainable Catch and Free Access to High Seas Fishing. Equally, it requires us to rethink the applicable criteria of fisheries management, in conjunction with the interrelationships that exists among the aquatic living resources and their environment. Again, it is evident the need for formalizing the figures of the condo-administration for the management of mankind's resources, as suggested in the Convention on the Law of the Sea. 
 
The management of the oceanic resources --as common goods-- is a challenge that we should face to find lasting solutions. Outside the sovereignty of the jurisdictional and territorial waters, weak international agreements limit the use of the marine resources in the high seas. With few access restrictions, the tragedy of the commons occurs too frequently, the countries are unable to control the fisheries, and the public opinion and the availability of new fishing technologies, place a growing pressure to change the rules that govern the free access to the live resources of the oceans. 
 
As domestic and oceanic fisheries provide the classic example of the wrongful management of the communal good, fishermen also face the loss of their modus vivendi due to the overfishing of the resources. The final extinction of a fish stock will fundamentally depend on the catch/cost of the last individual of a given population. 
 
While we celebrate 1998 as the United Nation's Year of the Ocean, let's hope that the designers of the so-called globalization take into consideration the consequences of an idle decision-making process. �