Dr. Florian Grisel (King’s College London and CNRS Paris-Nanterre) was presenting his paper on: Managing the fishery commons at Marseille: How a medieval institution failed to accommodate change in an age of globalization.

This paper offers a socio-historical study of the Prud’homie de pêche (the “Prud’homie”), a common-pool institution (“CPI”) that has managed the fishery commons at Marseille since the Middle Ages. The evidence presented here sheds light on specific challenges faced by the Prud’homie during the early stages of globalization: one challenge is the import of a new fishing technique (the madrague) in the early 17th century, and another challenge is the arrival of migrant fishermen from Catalonia throughout the 18th century. On this basis, this paper explores the ways in which globalization has impacted the Prud’homie and identifies the mechanisms through which these challenges might threaten the functioning of CPIs.

CIDS brings together researchers for the delivery of academic papers, occasionally followed by a discussant’s reply to the paper, in an informal, ‘brown bag’ setting. The papers will cover a variety of themes relating to international dispute settlement, with a variety of disciplinary approaches. The hope is to sustain a diversified academic community in this area and to keep debates going. Current plans are to host 2-3 brown bag seminars per year.

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CIDS Brown Bag Seminar No. 1