DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC POLICY

POL 663: Ocean Policy and Law

Lecture 8: Offshore Resource Development Protected and Endangered Marine Species Introduction
Weve just concluded a section that focuses our attention on property rights relating to potential resources (both living and nonliving) we find in the ocean. One basic piece of information we should have in our intellectual belts is that what is found in the ocean, essentially, is owned by the public. We know ownership of these resources can be transferred. For example, the public can transfer ownership to a private party; we discussed this in the topics of licensure and capture (government grants a license to certain resources, and the private individual gets ownership rights by applying effort and capturing the resource). In addition, ownership rights can also be transferred by operation of law for organisms that are mobile: fish, whales, dolphins, and other marine animals that are capable of locomotion are owned by the government (or not owned at all if in international waters the high seas) in which they are physically present. Thus, a marine animal that moves from State A waters to State B waters goes from being the public property of State A to State B when it enters the waters of State B. Public ownership comes with public responsibilities in ocean resources. This section discusses legal frameworks that aid in the management of a category of resources not mentioned earlier. Before we were discussing, primarily, resources within the context of direct values; we were looking at things found in the ocean that are considered valuable because they can be extracted from the ocean and used for some other purpose. In this section we are looking at a different kind of value, indirect value, where the focus is on the importance of the resource for its existence and associated ecological benefits such as biodiversity. So here we are not focused on how these specific marine resources can be manipulated for human benefit (like capturing fish for consumption or oil and gas as inputs for electricity generation), but rather on how their existence is important to our survival and wellbeing (by simply leaving them alone or ensuring they have sufficient habitat for their survival). As we encounter the major legal frameworks for this section, consider how they are different in kind from the earlier legal frameworks focused on the extraction and manipulation of marine resources for human use. For example, the earlier frameworks spent considerable time developing systems of property rights transfer and systems governance over the marine resources; the concern was about how to identify and

Page 2 of 13 distribute ownership rights to the resource, and also how to govern the extraction of the resource for purposes of long-term management. Here our policy-orientated concern will be more heavily influenced by other factors including protection of the resource at the exclusion of economic considerations. While the previous sections placed direct economic considerations at the forefront (maximizing economic gain of the resource), the legal frameworks here are most concerned with the protection of the resource, even when that protection results in economic harm. For example, we will see how the protection of endangered species can, as part of protecting the species, result in the protection of important habitat from functions like fishing and oil/gas development. The legal framework prioritizes survival of the species, which is quite different from our earlier definitions of marine resources at least when considering the term value in relation to resources. The goal of this section is to show, in large part, how offshore marine resources can be prioritized for their existence value. The legal frameworks employed to achieve this goal are different kinds of policy frameworks in the sense that they begin from a premise of protection-by-command, thus the implementation of the legal frameworks are not concerned with shared governance structures such as the regional council model under the Magnuson-Stevens Fisheries Act. The insight here for us is that when legal frameworks are created to implement a different kind of policy goal, the structures of that framework can operate quite differently in practice. Try and take note of this as you work with the materials in this section.

Creating Legal Frameworks to Protect Marine Resources

Creating legal frameworks aimed at protecting marine resources follows a different ideological path than creating frameworks to exploit marine resources. This is particularly true when the resource in question is both living and mobile; the framework is often limited by the geographic extent of the sovereign from which the law is passed. There are exceptions: for example, an international agreement on the protection of a marine resource can be binding against all nations that are signatories to the agreement. Thus, international agreements have the capacity to protect marine species that may be found in the various jurisdictions of the signatory nations, and also within international waters (the high sea) when encountered by those signatory nations; they are not necessarily protected in non-signatory nations or when found in international waters by non-signatory nations. We have previously discussed marine protected areas (MPAs), which represent an example of geospatial planning that is geared towards the protection of certain assets within the defined geographic marine area. MPAs are meant to protect nonliving and non-mobile things that exist in the protected area, for example a reef system or a culturally important sunken shipwreck. MPAs have also been used to protect living things, for example they have been created in certain diluted formats to protect known habitat for depleted and vulnerable fish stocks often referred to as closed areas. Even though the purpose of the closed area is to allow for the regeneration, and ultimate exploitation, of the target fish species, it operates under fundamental principles of

Page 3 of 13 protection and, by implication, can result in the protection of other species (intended or unintended) in the area. For example, by closing off a part of the ocean to human interactions (to protect a target fish species), the area can become a refuge for non-target species of fish and other marine organisms. Like placing a large wall around the area, the MPA can act like a virtual fence allowing the space to develop without human intervention. Moving back to the question of legal frameworks created for the protection of living marine resources, we have three examples to discuss in detail. The first two marine mammal protection and endangered species protection deal with national laws aimed at protecting certain living marine species to varying degrees. The second international whaling ban is our first example of an international legal framework for the protection of a specific group of marine mammals the whales. We will look at these examples in a contextual framework, seeing how they go about protecting the marine animals in question, the extent of that protection, and the surrounding policy issues that arise as a result of that protection.

What is Being Protected?

The following figure has been created to help us understand the different protections afforded under the three legal frameworks discussed in this section:

The figure is based on a continuum representing a summative variable meant to show an overall level of protection afforded by each legal framework. The purpose of this section is to discuss the reasons why each statute is placed on this continuum, and in the process of doing so highlight aspects of each framework for a clearer understanding of how each works to achieve its given goal. After this analysis is completed, we will review the policy implications of each framework in greater detail, looking to identify

Page 4 of 13 insights into how such frameworks are created and the extent to which they achieve various goals. To begin, we can note the placement of the different legal frameworks above on the spectrum. The International Whaling Ban sits far to the left signaling the limited protection afforded whales under this framework in comparison to the other frameworks being evaluated. The Endangered Species Act sits to the far right, suggesting marine animals that qualify under this law receive the most protection. Finally, the Marine Mammal Protection Act sits in the middle, suggesting it gives more protection than the International Whaling Ban, but less protection that the Endangered Species Act. The first point to take away from this summary is that the levels of protection afforded here are relative, meaning all of these legal frameworks seek protection of the marine resources in question. If we were to compare these statutes to other marine resource legal frameworks, we would find the level of protection is actually quite high in comparison to those other more extractive frameworks something like the following:

As we can see from the figure above, the three legal frameworks under consideration are created to protect marine resources, but afford different degrees of protection; this becomes more obvious when the frameworks are placed in comparison to other resource development, including the extraction of resources such as offshore oil and gas development and commercial fishing. Let us now look at the three protective frameworks highlighted here in more detail in order to better understand the factors that drive the difference between them.

Page 5 of 13 Whales Most of us understand the history of whaling; the book does a decent job of summarizing the major issues that led to the establishment of the 1946 International Whaling Convention. In sum, whales were traditionally sought after for extractive purposes, and different parts of the whale were used as inputs for human purposes (whale oil for various energy and lubricants, baleen teeth for corsets, combs, and other manufacturing uses, and so on). Over time advancements in technology allowed for an increasing efficiency in the capture of whales to the point the rate of extraction of certain species was outpacing the rate of replacement. In order to deal with the real possibility of driving certain whale species to extinction, the 1946 convention (understanding we have not discussed principles of international law in-depth as of yet) resulted in the establishment of the International Whaling Commission. Initially the Commission was set up to place a moratorium on whaling to increase the stock of the species. The idea is similar in concept to recent moratoriums of certain commercial fish stocks determined to be severely depleted; stop the human-based pressure on the population to allow it to rebound to what is considered a healthy level. Once the stocks rebound, then a more managed (i.e., sustainable) approach to the whaling can replace previous efforts. So the purpose of the ban on whaling in this international agreement is to momentarily halt the extraction of the whale species; there is no comprehensive desire under this agreement to prevent whaling long-term, but rather a reactionary acknowledgment of over-whaling to the point that a number of species are at-risk. Thus, within this international framework is the intended policy that whaling resume at some point in the future; the goal is not to prohibit whaling as an act, but rather to stop whaling for a period of time to allow populations to rebound before resuming the activity. Today issues generally involve the scientific take exception to the whaling moratorium, as well as exceptions for certain native activities that allow for subsistence hunting and cultural-historical connections to the activity. Regarding the scientific exceptions, countries such as Japan usually take their scientific limit of certain whale species each year, where the meat of the whales generally ends up in the Japanese markets. Other natives and countrymen are afforded certain takes depending on their historical connection to whaling. What is important to remember is the original IWC is an agreement among nations: no individual nation need agree voluntarily. In order to encourage the widest possible involvement of nations, compromises were made. It is likely that sometime within the next few decades, we will find where the IWC is headed regarding the current moratorium on a number of species. The policy question for the future will be whether whaling activities will continue in some capacity, regardless of population rebound. Undoubtedly impacting this decision will be the preferences of the evolving international community? Marine Mammals Marine Mammals are amazing in many respects. Strictly from an aesthetics standpoint, they are often termed charismatic mega-fauna because they are cute, cuddly, and we

Page 6 of 13 often give them human characteristics; movies such as Flipper and Free Willy represent this preference. However, we also know dolphins, for instance, are on a short list of animals that show self-recognition (they have a sense of self when they look in a mirror). This is very human-like, and might suggest a higher functioning brain capacity. Well, what are we to do with animals that exhibit behaviors closely paralleling our own? Should they be treated differently from other animals? If they should, is it because of how they look, or because of other factors, like exhibiting characteristics closer to our own? I am not sure there is a clear answer to this question, but I do know we have passed laws geared towards the protection of marine mammals, most specifically the Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA). The fact that we have consciously chosen to create a federal law for the proactive protection of marine mammals is an important policy statement in itself; consider: have you ever heard of the Land Mammal Protection Act? From an operational standpoint, the MMPA protects marine mammals from harm or harassment as defined within the statutory language; in essence, activities that rage from harassment to their deaths is prohibited. There are exceptions for intentional acts, the statutory details of which are presented in the text. Outside of the statutory language, the MMPA is a federal statute, meaning it is a law that is created and enforced solely in the United States. Thus, it only applies to activities occurring within U.S. jurisdiction, which means on U.S. soil or on vessels (ships) in other jurisdictions (ships flying under the U.S. flag). Unlike the whaling ban mentioned above, which is an international agreement amongst signatory nations (nations who have signed the agreement), the MMPA is a wholly national law. Endangered Species There are a number of frameworks, national and international, that attempt to proactively protect endangered species.1 The focus here is on the United States Endangered Species Act (ESA). This federal law was passed in recognition of the importance biodiversity plays in healthy ecosystem functioning, and thus the important role species diversity plays in supporting principles of biodiversity. To stem the observed decrease in species diversity, Congress passed the ESA, with its main goal of identifying species that are in danger of going extinct, and when so identified, placing special restrictions on the taking of those species, and also restricting the human impact on identified critical habitat for the species. This included the identification of a few large mega-fauna that are well known in the marine habitat, in particularly the North Atlantic Right Whale.2
1

The term proactive is being used here a bit loosely, particularly if the cause of the particular species moving towards extinction is due to human actions. What is meant here is that, whatever the reason for driving the species towards endangerment, the legal framework is envisioned as a means of identifying these species and, once identified, seeking to proactively protect their wellbeing.
2

In the case of the North Atlantic Right Whale (termed the right whale because it stay at the surface and float for a prolonged period when killed making it easier on the whalers

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The ESA prevents the taking of a listed species. Taking is defined as to harass, harm, pursue, hunt, shoot, wound, kill, trap, capture or collect, or to attempt to engage in such activity. The term harm is defined to include significant habitat modification or degradation. So, the ESA not only protects the species, but its essential habitat. The factors for listing under the ESA are as follows: The present or threatened destruction, modification, or curtailment of habitat or range; Overutilization; Disease or predation; Inadequacy of existing regulatory mechanisms; Other natural or manmade factors affecting continued existence.

Once a species is listed, the full protections of the ESA become realized. In practice this can result in significant changes to current human behavior patterns and economic expectations. One example that comes to mind is the listing of the North Atlantic Right Whale. One of its main ranges is an important shipping channel into Boston Harbor. After it was listed, changes were made to when ships could use the shipping lane. When policies were modified to favor shipping over whale protection, a citizen suit was brought, and the whales protection was determined judicially to take precedence over economic concerns.

Policy Interpretations of Protective Legal Frameworks

Now that we have some understanding of legal frameworks aimed at protecting marine resources, with examples of those protections in practice, we can step back and consider the policy implications of these frameworks. For example, the decision to create the Endangered Species Act happened well before the application of that law to the North Atlantic Right Whale in Boston Harbor; it is unlikely that the economic impacts of the kind that occurred in the Harbor were known when the statute was being passed. And this is but one example of how the ESA has been implemented since its passage, and the policy implications of its legacy on other factors of human wellbeing. In fact, what we find is that, often, protective legal frameworks like the ones described in this section juxtapose the welfare of specific (and often non-target) marine resources against direct economic prosperity; the original purpose of the statute (to protect the ecological values of biodiversity) can become lost when those values are pitted against immediate economic concerns. And as we can imagine, when the economic prosperity of global markets is faltering there is even less willingness to appreciate the indirect ecological values supported by these legal regimes. of the day), the pressures placed on its population are well documented to derive from human activities. Thus, previous periods of whaling for extractive purposes undoubtedly served to make the whale endangered today.

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To help us place the economics vs. ecology argument into greater context, let us look at a response described earlier regarding overfishing of commercial species. For recollection purposes, when a target fish species stock is overfished, the response has often been to place a moratorium on fishing effort for that particularly species. This often includes drawing a spatial boundary around what is considered important ecological habitat for the species and restricting human interactions in those areas, for example by creating a kind of marine protected area (MPA). Now the purpose of enacting the moratorium is awareness that the target species populations are depleted; this awareness often comes from the landings of the target species being much lower than anticipated (fishers are not finding the abundance of target species assumed when they go fishing). Similar to the triggering mechanism of the ESA, the response to identifying the depleted population is to apply restrictions on access to the fishery; by leaving the population alone (i.e., removing human effort), the fish population will naturally rebound to a point where fishing can resume. Often when these restrictions are placed on the population there is a strong degree of outrage from the fishing community (particularly when the restriction emanates from government authority rather than from the fishing community itself). The basis for this outrage varies, but is often founded on the idea that government is restricting access to a resource, and that restriction directly impacts the economic wellbeing of the fishers.3 Thus, there is a direct association between the government intervention and the economic impact of that intervention; this is clear in the example here because the marine resource being protected the fish is the proximate source of the economic wellbeing; the fish are being extracted because of their direct economic value as a food source for humans. Like the fishery collapse example, the legal frameworks discussed in this section proactively seek to protect marine resources based on certain conditions being met. In the case of the international whaling ban, the condition triggering the protection is precisely like the condition in our fishery example; the overfishing of certain whale populations has led to a crisis moment where a moratorium on whaling is required, or at least a moratorium is agreed to by a number of whaling nations. The condition triggering the Endangered Species Act protections is the fact that a species (including whales) may be listed as threatened or endangered, meaning their population numbers have become so low that, without intervention, extinction is a real possibility. Finally, the Marine Mammal Protection Act has a slightly different condition triggering protection: if one qualifies as a marine mammal under the statute, then they receive the protections of the statute. The conditions upon which these different statutes are triggered help to bring to the forefront some of the policy implications for our consideration. For example, marine mammal protection will occur under the MMPA without other preconditions being met;
3

Some fishers believe the underlying science is flawed, and thus the population is healthier than presumed.

Page 9 of 13 simply qualifying as a marine mammal affords you protection. There is no preliminary weighing of costs and benefits (at least in most cases), and thus considering the impact of the MMPA on economic activities is of secondary concern at best. The ESA is a bit different because its membership is predicated on meeting an important precondition; one can only become a member under the ESA if they have the qualities of being endangered or threatened as contemplated by the Act. In this way the ESA provides some consideration of economic impacts, but that consideration happens before the official listing of the species. What I mean here is that the impact of our economic actions on the species is not fully considered until the animal has met the threshold of protection under the ESA; until that time, and barring protections from other statutes, the economic activity occurs.4 Consider the fishery example from above: we continue to fish a target population until that population is clearly placed into jeopardy. Only until we have reached this jeopardy threshold do we place our economic priorities into a contextual discussion about preservation of the species. So when we look at these legal frameworks from a slightly larger perspective, we may see they are not entirely proactive in how they protect certain marine resources. Indeed, with the exception of the MMPA, these frameworks have preconditions that have triggered the creation and application of the framework to protect the resource; if the preconditions had not been met, then the resource in question would not be protected. For example, whales may still be hunted under the IWC if their populations were never threatened through human effort. So we may then see this policy area as one defined by circumstance rather than a concerted effort to highlight the ecological values of species as something paramount to human wellbeing (say through economic progress). Now this is not to say these policies do not prioritize the existence value of certain marine species, they certainly do. The point is to reference their utility by deciphering how they have come into existence, and also how they work from an operational standpoint. It may be that we can find other ways to prioritize marine species wellbeing that is not founded in legal frameworks; sometimes the best policy directions is to work within the law, but outside of legal frameworks. An excellent case study of doing just this, the dolphin safe tuna campaign, is a great way to highlight such policy directions.

The Dolphin Safe Tuna Campaign

A few decades ago dolphins were being inadvertently caught in the nets of tuna fishermen. An interesting correlation between dolphin pods and schooling tuna created this unfortunate situation; tuna fishers would observe dolphin pods at the surface of the water, and this would often indicate to them that tuna would be schooling below the dolphins at some depth. The fishers would then release a net around the dolphin pod and
4

Other statutes, like the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), may be triggered and require some evaluation of potential impacts of certain species prior to engaging in some economic activity. For example, a plan to develop a new highway across undeveloped land may require an assessment of the species that use that land and a determination of the impact of the highway development on that habitat.

Page 10 of 13 the net would ensnare both the tuna and dolphin. As the net was raised capturing the tuna, dolphins would also be captured. There was a fix for this unfortunate set of circumstances; nets used to capture the tuna (and inadvertently capture the dolphins) could be retrofitted with holes at the tops of the nets. As the net was pulled together, the holes would offer the dolphins an escape (since they were at the surface), but would not provide escape for most tuna because they would aggregate near the bottom of the net. However, the fix was not without cost. The nets are expensive and the retrofitting both removed the nets from use and was costly for fisheries of developing nations. The United States was quick to take action domestically on the incidental dolphin catch. Considering dolphins are marine mammals, one could easily argue capturing them in tuna nets was both harmful and harassing as contemplated under the Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA) and thus a violation of federal law. As such, there was a strong legal basis upon which the U.S. federal government could require the retrofitting of tuna nets to ensure dolphins were protected in the process. Of course this requirement was limited to the jurisdiction of the United States itself, as well as any tuna vessels operating under the United States flag in waters outside of U.S. jurisdiction. The requirement of protecting the dolphins did not apply to tuna caught outside of U.S. jurisdiction by foreign tuna fleets. Thus, the MMPA could not be used as the legal instrument of implementing a policy of protecting the dolphin outside of the jurisdiction of the United States; some other strategy would have to be employed to achieve the policy goal. The United States attempted to implement a wider reaching policy to protect the dolphins, one that would impact international tuna fishing operations. To accomplish this goal, the U.S. enacted a trade embargo on tuna that was caught in other jurisdictions without implementing dolphin safe fishing strategies. The idea here was that the U.S. could use its influence as a major importer of tuna products; since the U.S. market is a large consumer of tuna, the federal government could create an incentive for international fleets to adopt dolphin-safe fishing methods: access to the U.S. market. Tuna fishing operations that did not adhere to dolphin-safe fishing methods (essentially retrofitting their nets) would be excluded from the U.S. market and thus loose out economically. In essence, the U.S. attempted to formally use its consumptive power as a means of creating policy change in other countries. So this was not a command legal framework policy like the MMPA, but rather an exclusionary policy stance that placed a barrier to market participation for members who chose not to comply with the U.S. standards. The penalty for the exclusion was monetary in nature: exclusion from the U.S. market. The incentive was to make the costs of non-compliance far exceed the costs of retrofitting the nets. Upon consideration, a rather brilliant policy initiative to get around national sovereignty issues. The problem with this policy initiative the ban on imports of tuna fished with unsafe dolphin methods was that it conflicted with a separate legal framework that bounded the United States itself. The U.S. is a signatory member of the World Trade

Page 11 of 13 Organization (WTO), formerly known by the acronym GATT (General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade). This international law provides a framework that establishes rights and responsibilities with respect to international trade. When a country is a signatory to the agreement, they are bound to act within the duties and obligations of that agreement with respect to other countries. Now there are a lot of such duties and obligations contained in GATT at that time, one of which was a prohibition on interfering with existing trade agreements with other signatory members that are not explicitly allowed under the international agreement. So, unless GATT allowed the United States to prohibit the imports of tuna caught with dolphin unsafe methods from another signatory member country, the attempt by the U.S. to prevent such imports could be seen as a violation of its treaty obligations under GATT. One of the countries the U.S. attempted to enforce its tuna import embargo against was Mexico, at the time a signatory member of GATT. Mexican tuna fishers did not voluntarily retrofit their nets to protect dolphins, and when the U.S. banned the import of Mexican tuna, Mexico brought a trade violation claim against the U.S. under GATT. An international tribunal ruled against the United States5, stating GATT did not allow for such unilateral barriers to trade from signatory nations, and thus the U.S. action was outside of its obligations under GATT, resulting in a violation of Mexicos rights under GATT. One way for us to visually understand this result is to recall the relationship between legal frameworks and degrees of freedom offered to those existing under such frameworks.6 A visual representation of this relationship is presented here:

By becoming a signatory to GATT, the U.S. allowed itself to be subject to the jurisdiction of such a tribunal for alleged violations of GATT obligations.
6

A more detailed discussion of legal frameworks and their influence on government choices is contained in the administrative law course offered in this program.

Page 12 of 13 As shown in the visual representation above, the U.S. action of banning tuna from other countries fell outside the justifiable actions a nation can unilaterally take when they became a signatory to GATT. This fact provides a number of important points for our consideration. First, we can see that legal frameworks bound government (and individual) actions in many ways. Thus, the creation of legal frameworks should be carefully considered because they tend to result in limitations on discretion. From a policy perspective, laws must be carefully reviewed because they often limit policy options. In this example, the policy option the United States chose can be summarized as follows: Ban the importation of tuna caught with methods that harm dolphins regardless of the country from which the method is being employed.

This policy option seems quite reasonable on its face. A sovereign government wishes to advance a moral imperative and, by the fact that it is a sovereign, should be able to do so without much intervention. However, through the act of signing onto an international trade agreement, the U.S. has obtained both privileges and obligations. One would assume the privileges (benefits) outweigh the obligations (costs), otherwise why would the sovereign effectively give up some of its sovereign rights (like the right to place conditions on who it does business with). Whatever the reasons, in this case the U.S. attempt to use trade barriers as a means of promoting a policy goal impacting one of its obligations under GATT. There are other options for the U.S. if it wanted to use trade as the mechanism for promotion dolphin safe tuna harvesting methods. For example, the policy option mentioned above could be revised to state the following: Ban the importation of tuna caught with methods that harm dolphins only from countries that are non-signatories to GATT, or otherwise where such a ban does not violate affirmative duties placed on the United States through agreements with such countries.

We can see here how the language has been altered to accommodate the conditions in which the implementation of the ban would impact an existing obligation. Of course, the more conditions placed on the ban, the less effective it may end up being. For example, it may be that very few countries do business with the United States that includes the exporting of tuna to the U.S. where that country is also not a member of GATT or a similar international agreement that precludes the banning of tuna imports. In such situations the policy objective is significantly diluted and, in effect, very little gain is made in the effort. In our example here of the U.S. / Mexico dispute, the United States withdrew its important ban against Mexican tuna under the provisions of GATT. Thus, a different policy direction would need to be undertaken in order to achieve the goal of promoting dolphin safe tuna. Indeed, this alternative direction came in the form of a consumer boycott on tuna captured using unsafe methods. Advocacy groups were able to highlight

Page 13 of 13 dolphin safe tuna products by getting an official label onto these products; cans that contained tuna from unsafe fishing methods were not able to use the label, and this was strictly enforced (ensuring no free riding in the labeling). Along with the labeling came a strong public campaign to raise awareness about the issue, helping to establish public outrage. The result was a decision by the consumer in the U.S. to simply choose only dolphin safe tuna products. Even with higher prices, consumers voted with their wallets, and this effectively resulted in a de facto embargo on unsafe tuna; rather than the government violating international law to create the embargo, consumers in the free market simply made a preference choice entirely within their legal rights. This resulted in Mexico (and other countries) seeing a dramatic drop in the demand for their products on U.S. shelves. Not willing to be placed outside the U.S. marketplace, these countries adopted dolphin safe fishing methods allowing their products to fit within U.S. consumer preferences. The moral of the story here for our law and policy understanding is multifaceted. We should be able to see that making reasoned policy choices is about having a sound understanding of the environment in which we are working; if we want to protect dolphins (or other marine resources), then we must consider the entire environment in which dolphins exist. We can pass a federal law that includes dolphins as a subset of marine mammals, and then enforce that law within the jurisdiction of that law. If dolphins exist outside that jurisdiction and we wish our policy of protection to extend to those extraterritorial places dolphins exist, then we must expand our policy options. As we expand our policy options, we must incorporate limits placed on those options, and one such category of limitations are legal frameworks. Through understanding legal frameworks in the context of our policy problem we are placed in a superior position to make judgments about policy options; the directions we choose will stand a better chance of being found valid in the face of opposition (at least from a legal standpoint). This case study of the dolphin safe tuna campaign should help you see how law and policy interact in the protection of marine resources that have unique characteristics (including the ability to exist beyond sovereign boundaries). END OF SECTION.