Between 1985 and 1995, government agencies and interest
groups interacted in a recurring cycle of moratoria and
reviews in attempts to resolve a wide variety of
environmental, economic and social concerns about salmon
farming while making policies to manage the development of
the new industry in British Columbia. Using policy community
theory, this thesis analyzes how the community members
developed the salmon farming policy framework. Then, drawing
on the recommendations that were already advanced by
aquaculture planners from the early 1980s, the thesis
evaluates the policy framework that exists today.
Depending upon their power resources and their position
within the policy community, the members of the community
used different methods to influence the policy process. The
members of the sub-government maintained the status quo by
using methods such as restricting the access for interest
groups to the policy process and limiting the flow of
information to the attentive public. The members of the
attentive public increased their power by forming coalitions
and putting forward a common policy statement to the public
and government.
Maintaining the status quo became difficult when the New
Democratic Party (NDP) government came to power. In revising
provincial environmental policies , the NDP changed the
relative influence of the government agencies in the sub
government. These changes increased conflict among agencies
which the government addressed by undertaking an
environmental assessment and a public policy review.
The B.C. salmon farming policy community is identified
as a pressure pluralist community which emerges when
jurisdictional responsibility is fragmented among a number of
agencies and no mediating mechanism exists to bring together
the members of the community. As a result , the community
tends to make short term policy and functions without a long
term strategy.
The thesis concludes with six recommendations designed
to increase the access and input of all those who want to
participate in the policy process, to address the diversity
of issues raised within the policy community, to insure
social accountability when interest groups implement policy ,
and to fill the gaps in the existing policy framework.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:BVAU.2429/5843 |
| Date | 05 1900 |
| Creators | Zamluk, Rita Margaret |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Relation | UBC Retrospective Theses Digitization Project [http://www.library.ubc.ca/archives/retro_theses/] |
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