The study aims to understand the evolution of the community governance structures and their legal systems in the context of the features of the natural ecosystem that surrounds them. The location of the study is in the state of Andhra Pradesh, India. The detailed study describes the existing systems of participatory community based management and concludes that over time, the systems have come under increasing stress with the emergence of new, primarily, state driven systems. New capital intensive technologies were also introduced which also changed the traditional systems within and without the communities. Links with the external world, influx of new players into fish trade, increasing population and industrialization of coastal areas have also had a role to play in undermining the traditional systems which were best suited to work in a close-knot environment with smaller groups of people. Together these changes transformed the subsistence economy of fishing into a market based one of international stature and significance with the traditional systems becoming a casualty in the process.