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 30000003639881 HC110.W32 M36 1990 Open Access Book Book
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Summary

Summary

A comprehensive overview of marine environmental monitoring. Describes and evaluates current programs, examines the benefits and limitations of monitoring, and presents two case studies. Accessible to the non-specialist. Annotation copyright Book News, Inc. Portland, Or.


Reviews 1

Choice Review

This slim volume gives the consensus of a blue-ribbon committee on what is wrong with US marine environmental monitoring and how it should be improved. The subject involves science, engineering, law, economics, and politics; but except for examples and tangential citations, the volume spends most time in conceptualizing about institutional and organizational questions. This reflects a more general tendency by the US academic and political community to dwell on conceptual policy models in governmental programs, whereas the Japanese, for example, tend to focus on specific goals. The book's model strategy rather futilely seeks to start from scratch and generalize everything, whereas elsewhere it is emphasized that every case may be different and must be resolved with the discretion of local expertise. Accordingly, managers who need help with Step 1, "Define Expectations and Goals" may not be successful even with conceptual guidance. On the other hand, the three case studies (Chesapeake Bay, South California Bight, and ocean particulate disposal) and many examples and nuggets of information and reference are useful. The book is the most authoritative short overview of current programs and their (circumspectly cited) flaws. Although it tries to minimize jargon, the book's excessive "academese" and "bureaucratese" combined with the complexity of the subject will make it of less value to undergraduates and general readers than to professionals in environmental policy. -F. T. Manheim, SUNY at Stony Brook