The management of coastal and ocean fisheries is highly contentious. Industry interests focus on maximizing catches while conservationists and marine scientists have become increasingly concerned about dramatic declines in fish stocks and the health of ecosystems. Besides attempting to mediate among these interests, government agencies have pursued their own agendas, which have often lagged behind shifts in scientific understanding and public attitudes about the productivity of the oceans and uses of marine wildlife.

Atlantic Canada's fishing industry is in biological and ecological crisis. One initiative is an attempt to introduce market principles into fisheries management - including privatization and deregulation - by turning fish quota allocations into transferable commodities - individual transferable quotas (ITQs). These are management tools that allocate privileges or rights to harvest specified amounts of a quota to individuals or enterprises. Enclosing the Commons represents a nine-year investigation of this challenging and controversial initiative in fisheries management in Atlantic Canada. This is a study of an attempt to move toward the creation of quasi-property rights in marine resources, which carries the hope that increased private ownership of resources and responsibilities would lead to more stable, sustainable fisheries systems. This is a comprehensive, empirical analysis of the experiment in Nova Scotia, as well as comparison to similar endeavours in Iceland, New Zealand, and the United States. an intense effort to move an Atlantic Canadian fishery in the direction of both privatization and deregulation.