Howard Scott Gordon[1] (1924–2019) was a Canadian economist. His seminal 1954 article Economic Theory of a Common Property Resource: The Fishery marked the beginning of the modern economics study of fisheries.[2] He spent most of his career teaching and writing in the history and philosophy of economics.

Life

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Gordon was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia. He gained his undergraduate degree from Dalhousie University in 1944.[3] He was an economics graduate student at Columbia University and McGill University.[4]

He was a lecturer in economics at McGill in 1947-1948.[3] He then joined the recently established Carleton College (now Carleton University) in Ottawa.[3] He helped found the Economics Department at Carleton University and chaired the department from 1948 to 1966. He was a professor at the department of economics at Indiana University from 1966 to 1988.[4] He chaired the Economics Department at IU from 1970 to 1973. From 1983 he had a split appointment with the History and Philosophy of Science Department. He retired in 1988.[4]

Gordon taught summer courses in the history of economic theory at Queen's University from 1970 until 1996.[4][5]

Fishing quotas

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Scott's most well-known and seminal research on the tragedy of the commons was found in a 1954 Journal of Political Economy paper The Economic Theory of Common Property Resource: The Fishery. The role of individual fishing quotas (IFQs), also known as "individual transferable quotas" (ITQs), was shown by Gordon in his original research about fishing economics.[6][7]

Honors and legacy

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Gordon's students included Margaret Schabas,[8] and J. Alfred Broaddus.[9] In Welfare, Property Rights and Economic Policy - Essays and Tributes in Honour of H. Scott Gordon by T.K. Rymes the author celebrates Gordon as one of "Canada's most distinguished social scientist and economics scholars."[10] Rymes' book was cited in the International Journal of Transport Economics (1993).[11] Gordon was a Guggenheim Fellow for the academic year 1964–1965.[4][1] For the period of 1977-1978, Gordon served as president of the Canadian Economics Association.[12] His papers are in an archival repository at Indiana University. John Davis of Marquette University reviewed History of Philosophy of Social Science by H.Scott Gordon in the Southern Economic Journal.[13]

Articles

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  • Gordon, H. Scott (1954). "The Economic Theory of a Common-Property Resource: The Fishery". Journal of Political Economy. 62 (2): 124–142. doi:10.1086/257497. S2CID 15945948. Retrieved 29 January 2023.

Books

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References

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  1. ^ a b "Howard Scott Gordon". John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.
  2. ^ Bjorndal, Trond; Munro, Gordon (2012). The economics and management of world fisheries (1st ed.). Oxford University Press. p. 21. ISBN 978-0199576753.
  3. ^ a b c "H. Scott Gordon". IU Alliance of Distinguished and Titled Professors. Indiana University. Retrieved 29 January 2023.
  4. ^ a b c d e "H. Scott Gordan". Department of History and Philosophy of Science and Medicine. Retrieved 29 January 2023.
  5. ^ "H. Scott Gordon papers, 1947-1993, (bulk 1966-1992)". Archives Online at Indiana University.
  6. ^ Cochran, Jr., David M.; Reese, Carl A. (Spring 2012). Southeastern Geographer. University of North Carolina Press. p. 22. ISBN 978-0807872581. Evidence about IFQ systems began with H.Scott Gordon's (1954) seminal effort in the understanding of fishing economics. Gordon demonstrated why open access fisheries often perform poorly in economic terms . . . .
  7. ^ "Where Pope Francis Got It Wrong". Newsweek. 1 October 2015. Retrieved 20 June 2019.
  8. ^ Schabas, Margaret; Wennerlind, Carl (2008). David Hume's Political Economy. Routledge. ISBN 978-1134362509.
  9. ^ "Al Broaddus Economic Keynote Speaker". October 2014. Retrieved 20 June 2019.
  10. ^ Rymes, T.K. "Welfare, Property Rights and Economic Policy - Essays and Tributes in Honor of H. Scott Gordon". Cambridge Press.
  11. ^ Rymes, T. K. "Vol. 20, No. 3, OCTOBER 1993 of International Journal of Transport Economics / Rivista internazionale di economia dei trasporti on JSTOR". www.jstor.org. Retrieved 20 June 2019.
  12. ^ "Organizational History, 1967-2018". Canadian Economics Association. Archived from the original on 2016-02-26. Retrieved 2019-06-20.
  13. ^ Published version. Southern Economic Journal, Vol. 59, No. 4 (April 1993): 835-836. DOI. © 1993 Southern Economic Association. Used with permission
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