This is a study of Northern Norway and Atlantic Canada, two regions experiencing a severe crisis due to overexploitation of fisheries resources. The work of a group of researchers from Canada, Norway, and the United States, it examines the implications of common market integration, privatized resource management, and small business development policies for fishery-dependent communities in terms of long-term sustainability and participatory democracy.

The book is broken into three sections: an examination of the economic and institutional history of the fisheries in Norway and Atlantic Canada, a study of the regulatory regimes used in the fisheries of these two regions, and an analysis of reactions in three communities, two in Canada and one in Norway, to the decline and collapse of fish stocks. Comparative, multidisciplinary, and multinational in approach, it is a major contribution to the literature on fishing regulations, the role of the state, and resource development in the North Atlantic.