Icelandic foremen and skippers: the structure and evolution of a folk model

There are two folk models to explain differential fishing success in Iceland. One applies to the short term and is based on material factors; the other refers to the long term of seasons and careers and centers on the personal qualities of skippers, or the skipper effect. We show first that the skipper effect cannot account for differential fishing success. We then develop a sociological explanation for the ideology of the skipper effect and show how the ideology developed in response to historical changes in the social relations of production in fishing from the 19th century as labor and fish both became commodities, as Iceland gained independence from Denmark, and as new fishing technology developed. Finally, we describe the earlier conceptual scheme of fishing, which entailed foremen rather than skippers, and show how the role of skipper became elaborated as fishing developed into an autonomous economic field separate from other aspects of peasant production. [fishing, folk models, Iceland, social relations of production, history]