Toward a Theory of Compliance in State-Regulated Livelihoods: A Comparative Study of Compliance Motivations in Developed and Developing World Fisheries

Abstract

This paper addresses the question of how states can best promote citizens’ compliance with laws that regulate livelihoods. Based on ethnographic data from fishing communities in three countries – Norway, Canada, and South Africa – the paper compares compliance motivations that exist under different socio-economic and political conditions. The comparisons gave rise to a typology of three compliance motivations: deterrence, moral support for the law’s content, and the legislator’s authority. This paper then identifies three governable preconditions – enforcement, empowerment of citizens, and civic identity – that respectively explain these motivations. The paper argues that the compliance discourse in a given type of state must be framed such that it includes at least the governable preconditions for compliance that have not been met in that state. Consequently, a functional compliance strategy would vary between different state types. The paper thus questions the transferability of the developed world’s compliance discourses to the developing world.