Revisiting Lofoten: Co-managing fish stocks or fishing space?

The Lofoten fishery has become a paradigmatic case of co-management. In lig ht of the recent changes in the regulatory system in Lofoten, this paper ta kes a new look at the management institution in the Lofoten fishery. Our ma in interest lies not in empirical observation, however, but in the use to w hich the Lofoten case has been put in the co-management tradition. In what sense does the Lofoten fishery represent a co-management system? What is "c o-managed" in Lofoten? We argue that co-management in Lofoten is more about fishing space than fish stocks. Furthermore, we argue that the misreading of the Lofoten case reflects a more general weakness of the co-management l iterature by not taking seriously the inherent problems of fisheries resour ce management.