Environmental adaptation, political coercion, and illegal behavior: Small-scale fishing in the Gulf of California. Item Type text; Dissertation-Reproduction (electronic) Authors Vasquez-León, Marcela. Publisher The University of Arizona. Rights Copyright © is held by the author. Digital access to this material is made possible by the University Libraries, University of Arizona. Further transmission, reproduction or presentation (such as public display or performance) of protected items is prohibited except with permission of the author. Download date 11/10/2021 09:35:31 Link to Item http://hdl.handle.net/10150/187441 INFORMATION TO USERS This manuscript has been reproduced from the microfilm master. UMI films the text directly from the original or copy submitted. Thus, some thesis and dissertation copies are in typewriter face, while others may be from any type of computer printer. The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. 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Contact UMI directly to order. UMI A Bell & Howell Infonnation Company 300 North Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor MI 48106-1346 USA 313n61-4700 8001521-0600 1 ENVIRONMENTAL ADAPTATION, POLmCAL COERCION, AND ILLEGAL BEHAVIOR: SMALL-SCALE FISHING IN THE GULF OF CALIFORNIA by Marcela Vasquez LOOn Copyright 0 Marcela Vasquez LOOn 1995 A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of the DEPARTMENT OF ANTHROPOLOGY In Partial Fulftllment of the Requirements For the Degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY In the Graduate College THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA 1995 UMI Number: 9624146 Copyright 1995 by Vasquez-Leon, Marcela All rights reserved. UMI Microform 9624146 Copyright 1996, by UMI Company. All rights reserved. This microform edition is protected against unauthorized copying uuder Title 17, United States Code. UMI 300 North Zeeb Road Ann Arbor, MI48103 THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA ® 2 GRADUATE COLLEGE As members of the Final Examination Committee, we certify that we have read the dissertation prepared by Harcela Vasquez Leon entitled Environmental Adaptation, Political Coercion, and Illegal Behavior: Small-Scale Fishing in the Gulf of California and recommend that it be accepted as fulfilling the dissertation requirement for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy 1itomas R. HcGuire (J~~ k. Pa..J'<, Thomas K. Park --rz~.4J~ f". S t~~ Thomas E. Sheridan Date Date Date Final approval and acceptance of this dissertation is contingent upon the candidate's submission of the final copy of the dissertation to the Graduate College. I hereby certify that I have read this dissertation prepared under my direction and recommend that it be accepted as fulfilling the dissertation requirement. rb t.. revV<. ~. -\C. 2~~--- /Ljl{qS- \l~\-~~ Dissertation Director Date Thomas R. HcGuire and Thomas K. Park 3 STATEMENT BY AUTHOR This dissertation has been submitted in partial fulfillment of requirements for an advanced degree at The University of Arizona and is deposited in the University Library to be made available to borrowers under rules of the library. Brief quotations from this dissertation are allowable without special permission, provided that accurate acknowledgment of source is made. Requests for permission for extended quotation from or reproduction of this manuscript in whole or in part may be granted by the copyright holder. 4 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I have met many good people in the Sonoran Coast and I thank a few in particular for their hospitality and friendship: Ram6n and Elvira Taca1o, Cesar Osuna Cabanillas, the Oquita brothers and their families, Rebeca Ballesteros, and Rosa Quintero of Empalme. Jose Luis and Alicia Flores, Don Ricardo Flores, Jose Cruz and Belma Guadalupe Olivas Grajeda, Carlos and Leticia Bermudez, Ignacio Morales, Jose Luis Bellot, and Marco Villegas of Guaymas. Sigifredo Galvan and family of Puerto Penasco. I also thank people from the Centro Regional de Investigaci6n Pesquera which provided institutional affiliation in Guaymas: Hugo Montiel, Ana Corona, Marfa de los Angeles, Celio, Eberardo, Miguel Angel Marquez, Rufmo Morales, Franciso Mendez, and Manuel Navarez. I also thank people in Tucson who helped me with the research. I am particularly greatful to Dr. Thomas R. McGuire who supervised this dissertation from the beginning, for always giving me exemplary scholarly advise, and for being a friend. To Dr. Thomas Park for his continuous support and for guiding much of my graduate training. Dr. Park and Dr. Thomas Sheridan both made valuable editorial suggestions on the drafts of this study. I also thank the former director of the Bureau of Applied Research in Anthropology at the University of Arizona, Dr. Carlos Velez-Ibanez, and the current director Dr. Timothy Finan, for giving me a job and believing in me. Thanks are also due to those who partially supported my research: the Faculty Development Fellowship from the Graduate College at the University of Arizona, Dr. Adela Allen, Associate Dean, and Geraldine aIds, program coordinator. Also Small Grants for Dissertation from the College of Saint Teresa Scholarship Committee. Thanks are also due to Ziba Ghassemi who drafted the maps. Marfa Rodriguez, Laura Stucky, Brian Fulfrost, and Norma Castro who helped me in a variety of ways. Finally, lowe my deepest gratitude to my husband, Heman Aubert, for his continuous encouragement and patience. The long hours of discussion and his assistance in the field make this work in many ways as much his as it is mine. 5 TABLE OF CONTENTS I. liST OF IILUSTRATIONS ...................................................................... 8 II. LIST OF TABLES ............................................................................. 9 1. Introduction ...................................................................................... 12 1.1 Uncertainty in theFisheries ........................................................... 16 1.2 The Alliance of Biology and Economics ........................................... 17 1.2.1 Harmony in nature .............................................................. 19 1.2.2 Common-property resources .................................................... 20 1.2.3 The individual profit-maximizer ............................................. 23 1.2.4 Bigger is better................................................................. 24 1. 3 Maritime Anthropology ............................................................. 26 1.4 Contribution of the Proposed Research ......................................... 30 1.5 Overview of the Dissertation .....................•................................ 31 1.6 A Note on Method .................................................................. 33 PART ONE. ECOLOGY AND HISTORY IN THE FORMATION OF SMALL-SCALE FISHING ............................................................................... 36 2. Biology, Behavior and Seasonality in the Struggle for Shrimp ..................... 37 2.1 The Gulf of California and its Fisheries .......................................... 39 2.2 Shrimp Ecology in the Gulf of California ...................................... .45 2.3 "Catchability" in a Sequential Fishery .......................................... ,49 2.4 The Season's Progression ..........................................................56 2.5 A Day During the Peak of the Season ........................................... 63 3. La Heroica de Guaymas and Empalme la Ciudad Jardfn ............................ 73 3.1 Guaymas Merchants and the Sonoran Economic Miracle ...................... 83 3.2 Guaymas in the Revolution ........................................................ 98 3.3 The Commercial Elites Become Armadores and Industriales Pesqueros ............................................................................ 102 3.4 From Unlucky Braceros to Shrimp Fishermen ................................ 108 PART TWO. THE SHRIMP INDUSTRY IN MEXICO: A GENERAL OVERVIEW ............................................................................. 114 4. Growth and Collapse of the Shrimp Industry ........................................ 115 4.1 The Beginnings: shrimp cooperatives and institutionalized corruption ..... 118 4.2 Shrimp Becomes an Economically Important Commodity .................. 119 6 TABLE OF CONTENTS -- Continued 4.3 Renationalization of the Shrimp Industry .......................................... 132 4.4 A Political Drama: local manifestations of larger economic predicaments. 138 4.5 Everything for Sale ............................................................... 143 4.6 Private Banks and Shrimp Scarcity: a deadly combination ................. 147 5. Biology