The United Kingdom and The United States about their attitudes towards whales and whaling. 57% of the US respondents confirmed that they "opposed the hunting of whales under any circumstances" and 55% felt that "even regulated whaling must be abandoned" (Skare 1994). Although none of the respondent groups showed a high level of knowledge on the subject, all seemed to agree on the following points. 1. The protection of whale habitats from pollution and disturbance. 2. Maintaining an "ecosystem" perspective in whale management. 3. Basing harvest levels on the most sound scientific advice available. In Norway where whale hunting was once a big industry the proponents of whaling scoff at the prospect of a world without whaling. Norway claims that whaling in their country dates back more than ten thousand years (Skare 1994) and that history, they claim, gives them the right to exploit the resources that they have available to them; what they don't say is that those "resources" aren't really their own to exploit. Eric Doyle, a member of Greenpeace, an environmental watchdog group, explained to me (over the telephone) that the boundaries that countries draw up don't mean anything to whales or even to whaling boats in some instances. Doyle, explained that because Norway is one of the very few countries that have resumed whaling ,their boats aren't closely watched, and ...
