With participants expected from as far away as Maryland, plans for a massive fishermen’s protest Friday against federal policies at the regulators’ regional offices got a boost yesterday with the release of a supportive "Dear Colleagues" note from Elinor Ostrom, the new Nobel laureate in economics.
A professor at the University of Indiana, Ostrom said major commitments on campus will keep her from joining the protest, which is informally generating a list of grievances that includes converting common resources into privatized commodities or catch shares in the groundfish and scallop fisheries.
But in an e-mail she said "could be read from me at the event," Ostrom wrote, "I wish I could join you today as you struggle with an important issue for you and your families and for all of us affected by the fisheries of the world."