Against the Wind: The Difficult Task of a Fisheries Researcher in the Early 20th Century

In his seminal paper, Gordon (1954) argued that, in a situation of open access and competition, the market would not lead to the most efficient solution in resource use. Almost four decades earlier, in 1911, a Danish economist, Jens Warming, put this issue and made a very similar analysis for the fisheries sector. This research makes a reflection on the proposed explanation for the common property problem and asks what went wrong and why the important achievements of Warming had not the justified academic applause and practical impact.