Are Marine National Monuments Better than National Marine Sanctuaries? U.S. Ocean Policy, Marine Protected Areas, and the Northwest Hawaiian Islands

Abstract:     
Since at least the 1996 Sustainable Fisheries Act amendments to the Magnuson-Stevens Fisheries Conservation and Management Act, the United States has, at least nominally, been pursuing a policy of sustainable management of fisheries. Nevertheless, concerns about the status of marine fisheries remain, and both the Pew Oceans Commission (2003) and the U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy (2004) recommended that the United States use more marine protected areas and marine reserves to restore these fisheries and better maintain sustainable harvests.

A variety of legal mechanisms exist in federal law to establish marine protected areas. This article provides an initial instrument choice analysis of these various legal vehicles for establishing marine protected areas and marine reserves in the United States, using the history of the protection of Northwestern Hawaiian Islands coral reef ecosystem as an illustration of the advantages and disadvantages of each. The article concludes that, if the United States decides to establish a national system of marine protected areas to enhance the sustainability of its marine fisheries, legislation that incorporates some of the advantages of the Antiquities Act may be an appropriate choice.

Keywords: sustainable development, sustainable, sustainability, fishery, fisheries, marine protected area, marine reserve, MPA, marine national monument, Northwestern Hawaiian Islands, Antiquities Act, Magnuson-Stevens, executive order, Marine Protection Research and Sanctuaries Act, national marine sanctuary

Accepted Paper Series