Tankers, wells, pipes and pumps: Agents and mediators of water geographies in Amman, Jordan

Daanish Mustafa
Department of Geography, King’s College, London, UK; daanish.mustafa@kcl.ac.uk

Samer Talozi
Department of Civil Engineering, Jordan University of Science and Technology (JUST), Irbid, Jordan; samerbse@just.edu.jo

ABSTRACT: Water tankers and private wells along with the municipal piped water system have become an important feature of the techno-social assemblage of water supply in Amman, Jordan. The article takes a theoretically hybrid approach aimed at generating a conversation between actor-network theory (ANT) and the critical-realist and political-economic approaches. We undertake both ANT-inspired and then social-structural analysis of the geography of access to water in Amman. The ANT-based analysis of 'things' like tankers, wells, pipes and pumps draws attention to their relational agency in enabling or constraining access to water. The structural analyses remind us of the enduring class-, gender- and geopolitically based power relations that provide the context for the technologies, or things, to work. The key argument is that ANT is useful as a meso-level framework, which may enrich structuralist narratives on geographies of access to water. Specifically, in the case of Amman, Jordan, the inequitable access to water is linked to the history of the Jordanian state, its security imperatives and the technologies that are pressed into service to manage water.

KEYWORDS: Actor-Network Theory (ANT), Critical Realism, water tankers, private wells, Amman, Jordan

Integrating water footprint and sefficiency: Overcoming WF criticisms and improving decision making

Naim Haie
Water Resources and Environment Division, Civil Engineering Department, University of Minho, Guimarães, Portugal; and International Water Resources Association, Paris, France; naim@civil.uminho.pt

Miguel Rodrigues Freitas
Department of Studies and Planning, Águas do Norte, SA (AdP Group), Portuguese Public Water and Wastewater Company, Guimarães, Portugal; miguel.freitas@adp.pt

Joana Castro Pereira
Lusíada University, Porto, Portugal; and IPRI-NOVA, Portuguese Institute of International Relations, Lisbon, Portugal; mail@joanacastropereira.com

ABSTRACT: The Water Footprint Network (WFN) methodology has emerged as a major framework of/for policy analysis as water problems increase. Being addressed by a growing body of literature, water footprint (WF) accounting has advanced substantially in recent years, whereas its sustainability assessment has lagged behind. For this and other reasons, the suitability of WF in guiding water management and planning has been criticised. Simultaneously, water efficiency has gone through much discussion and a new framework called 'sefficiency' (sustainable efficiency) has been presented. It uses a universal law (water balance) to develop systemic and comprehensive performance indicators, integrating water quantity, pollution and value to reveal their trade-offs in multi-level governance with climate descriptors and stakeholder enablers. This article revisits WF criticisms in six categories and advances the sustainability assessment phase of the WFN framework via sefficiency. Starting from, and critically reviewing, a two-country example presented by Dennis Wichelns, we illustrate, through nine (3x3) scenarios, real possibilities of integrating WF and sefficiency. The results reveal that economic and/or WF perspectives alone are insufficient to improve water decision-making processes, not necessarily guaranteeing an increase in the performance of the full system. Consequently, policy makers should be doubly careful about, for example, WF reductions, if sefficiency also decreases.

KEYWORDS: Water footprint, virtual water trade, sefficiency (sustainable efficiency), water resources management, water policies

Reimagining spaces of innovation for water efficiency and demand management: An exploration of professional practices in the English water sector

Claire Hoolohan
Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, University of Manchester, UK; claire.hoolohan@manchester.ac.uk

Alison L. Browne
Sustainable Consumption Institute/Geography, University of Manchester, UK; alison.browne@manchester.ac.uk

ABSTRACT: Social practice theories have established an important counter narrative to conventional accounts of demand. The core argument of this body of research is that, having focused on informing and incentivising behavioural change, demand management has largely neglected the social and material dimensions of everyday action that shape how and why resources are used. Despite making a compelling case for reframing demand management, there is limited evidence of practice-based approaches having gained a foothold in policy and business practices. This raises important questions regarding how and why certain modes of intervention are pursued at the expense of others and, more broadly, the factors that shape the pace and direction of innovation in demand management. In this paper we turn a practice-lens towards the professional practices of demand management. Using mixed methods, we demonstrate how specific modes of intervention emerge as priorities within a social, political, semiotic and material landscape of professional practice. Our empirical analysis highlights four particular contingencies of demand management that constrain the scope of interventions pursued. These are industry expectations and ideals; modes of collaboration; processes of evidencing action; and hydrosocial disturbances. We discuss the implications of these findings, making suggestions as to how innovation in the practices of demand management might be facilitated, and the role of academic research in this process.

KEYWORDS: Water, demand management, governance, behaviour change, intervention, social change

Development through bricoleurs: Portraying local personnel’s role in implementation of water resources development in Rural Nepal

Juho Haapala
Water and Development Research Group, Aalto University, Aalto, Finland; juho.haapala@aalto.fi

Pamela White
Development Studies, University of Helsinki, Finland; and Development Consulting, FCG International ltd.; pamela.white@fcg.fi

ABSTRACT: This article considers the little studied role of local implementation staff and their institutional operational environment at the grassroots of a rural development intervention in Nepal. The study describes the challenges the implementing staff encounters in relation to the steering policies, project modalities, local communities, partners in government administration, and their personal motivations. It observes the ways in which the implementing individuals must collaborate with their partners and facilitate the planned changes in local institutions and individual behaviours. The findings indicate that much of the actual implementation process at the grassroots is determined by informal, improvised, and fuzzy institutional surroundings, quite different to designed or regulated governance environs. The ability to operate in these less-regulated environs determines many of the implementation outcomes at the grassroots. Researchers, managers and decision-makers would benefit from incorporating institutional bricolage to the analyses of development interventions.

KEYWORDS: Institutional bricolage, implementation, adaptive management, rural development, Nepal

Comparative analysis of institutions to govern the groundwater commons in California

Ruth Langridge
University of California, Santa Cruz, CA, USA; rlangrid@ucsc.edu

Christopher Ansell
University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA; cansell@berkeley.edu

ABSTRACT: The management of groundwater, a common-pool resource, is a fundamental collective action problem that can lead to over-exploitation. Our paper examines the management of two groundwater basins in California’s Central Coast region whose geographic proximity, land use patterns, socioeconomic characteristics, and timing of institutional formation provide an ideal basis for comparative study. However, each basin is governed by a distinctive institutional configuration. The Pajaro Valley Water Management Agency is a legislatively created Special Act District with a collective public management focus, while the Santa Paula Groundwater Basin is managed through a court adjudication with a rights-based focus. We compare the legal and administrative foundations of these institutional arrangements and examine their implications for the polycentric regulation of sustainable groundwater use. We find that while adjudication may specify groundwater rights, an approach that scholars argue can be critical for achieving sustainability, it also promotes insularity with a wider polycentric system and this ultimately limits its management strategies. The Special Act District, by contrast, does not encourage as clear an allocation of water rights, but does encourage a broad sustainability mission and wider polycentric engagement, though it still struggles with declining groundwater levels. Ultimately, neither institutional arrangement fully addresses the problem of groundwater sustainability. This suggests the need for further research on how institutional configurations and developmental pathways impact resource outcomes.

KEYWORDS: Groundwater management, comparative study, adjudicated groundwater basins, special act groundwater districts, polycentric, facilitating conditions, California

Chronicle of a demise foretold: State vs. local groundwater management in Texas and the High Plains Aquifer system

Alvar Closas
International Water Management Institute (IWMI), Cairo, Egypt; a.closas@cgiar.org

François Molle
UMR G-Eau, Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD), Univ Montpellier, France; and (at the time of the research) International Water Management Institute (IWMI), Cairo, Egypt; francois.molle@ird.fr

ABSTRACT: This paper assesses a case of co-management of groundwater between the state of Texas, pushing for the rationalisation of groundwater management, and local (mainly farming) communities organised in Groundwater Conservation Districts (GCDs), which are protective of their private groundwater rights. We first describe the main legal and policy steps that have shaped this relationship. The article focuses on the Texan portion of the Ogallala Aquifer in the High Plains aquifer system – an almost non-renewable system covering 90,000 km2 and providing 95% of the irrigation needs in northern Texas. With this example, we further highlight the strategies of both parties, the different political, administrative, legal and regulatory complexities of the struggle around the definition of GCD-level aquifer management rules (the so-called 'Desired Future Conditions'). We end by reflecting on the power balance that has resulted from successive adjustments to a co-management form of governance, the advantages and disadvantages of a multi-layered state water governance system, and whether the de facto 'managed depletion' of the Ogallala Aquifer in Texas should be seen as an achievement or a failure.

KEYWORDS: Groundwater governance, co-management, groundwater policy, regulation, aquifer depletion, Ogallala, Texas

Adaptive groundwater governance and the challenges of policy implementation in Idaho’s Eastern Snake Plain aquifer region

Margaret V. du Bray
Augustana College, Rock Island, IL, USA; megdubray@augustana.edu

Morey Burnham
Idaho State University, Stop, ID, USA; burnmore@isu.edu

Katrina Running
Idaho State University, Stop, ID, USA; runnkatr@isu.edu

Vicken Hillis
Boise State University, Boise, ID, USA; vickenhillis@boisestate.edu

ABSTRACT: Globally, groundwater overdraft poses significant challenges to agricultural production. As a result, it is likely that new water management policies and governance arrangements will be needed to stop groundwater depletion and maintain agricultural viability. Drawing on interviews with state and non-state water managers and other water actors, this paper provides a study of a recent resource management agreement between surface water and groundwater irrigators in the Eastern Snake Plain Aquifer region of Idaho. Using adaptive governance as our descriptive framework, we examine how groundwater governance arrangements emerge and are applied to mitigate the impacts of groundwater overdraft. Our findings suggest that adaptive governance, while not a stated goal of the agreement, may enable flexible and sustainable social and ecological outcomes. Our findings also indicate that this new governance arrangement creates a vacuum in enforcement authority that may prove challenging as the management agreement is implemented. These findings extend our understanding of the conditions necessary for effective adaptive governance of groundwater resources, and highlight the challenge of creating capacity for local resource managers as governance shifts from more bureaucratic to adaptive and decentralised arrangements.

KEYWORDS: Groundwater governance, adaptive governance, irrigated agriculture, US West, Idaho

The ostrich politics of groundwater development and neoliberal regulation in Mexico

Jaime Hoogesteger
Water Resources Management Group, Wageningen University, Wageningen, The Netherlands; jaime.hoogesteger@wur.nl

ABSTRACT: In this article I present the politics that spurred groundwater development in Central and Northern Mexico between 1930 and 1990, and analyse the working/effects of the neoliberal groundwater policies that were implemented in the country since the 1990s. I first present, based on an analysis of the Comarca Lagunera and the state of Guanajuato, the socio-economic, political and institutional dynamics that shaped groundwater development between 1930 and 1990, with a special focus on how with state support large commercial farmers and small ejidatarios developed groundwater irrigation. My analysis shows how the actors involved in groundwater development, just like ostriches, stuck their head in the sand, oblivious to aquifer overdraft and its environmental consequences. Then I present how – since the 1990s – neoliberal groundwater regulation policies have worked out on the ground opening the doors to regulatory capture and groundwater accumulation through capital, oblivious to sustained aquifer overdraft, a shrinking peasant ejido sector, increased rural outmigration and the health threat of toxic concentration of Fluoride and Arsenic in many groundwater dependent areas. This analysis raises serious doubts about the capacity of – often (inter)nationally lauded – neoliberally inspired groundwater policies to contribute to socio-environmental sustainability and equity.

KEYWORDS: Groundwater, water policy, water markets, water grabbing, agrarian policies, Mexico

Water grabbing via institutionalised corruption in Zacatecas, Mexico

Darcy Tetreault
Department of Development Studies, Autonomous University of Zacatecas (Universidad Autónoma de Zacatecas), Mexico; email: darcytetreault@yahoo.com

Cindy McCulligh
Department of Development Studies, Autonomous University of Zacatecas (Universidad Autónoma de Zacatecas), Mexico; email: cindymcculligh@gmail.com

ABSTRACT: Groundwater overdraft is a growing problem in the central region of Zacatecas. In this high-altitude semiarid region located in the Western Sierra Madre of north central Mexico, the over-exploitation of aquifers is compounded by problems of water contamination and unjust distribution. Most of the water extracted from wells, and the best quality water, is delivered to the private sector: to large- and medium-scale farmers and to industrial producers of beverages. Conversely, water with concentrations of arsenic and fluoride far above permissible limits for human consumption is channelled mostly to the public urban sector. Recently, the government of the state of Zacatecas and the National Water Commission have laid plans to build a large dam on the Milpillas River to the west of the state capital, to increase the supply of water for public, urban and industrial consumption in the central region of the state. What are the political economic forces that have historically shaped and continue to shape the water crisis in the central region of Zacatecas? Why have existing water governance policies and practices been unable to effectively address the crisis? Can an interbasin transfer from the Milpillas Dam deliver on its promise to allow aquifers in this region to recover from over-exploitation? We introduce and employ the concept of institutionalised corruption to explain the modus operandi of infringement on water laws by government agencies and large water consumers and/or polluters, particularly for the purpose of accommodating the needs of extractive capital. Along these lines, we demonstrate that the Milpillas Dam will not allow aquifers to recover and argue that the driving political economic forces behind the project treat it as a vehicle for the realisation of capital through the commodification of produced water, which allows for the extraction of rent.

KEYWORDS: Institutionalised corruption, water grabbing, value grabbing, rent, Zacatecas, Mexico

A doubly invisible aquifer: Hydrogeological studies and actorsʼ strategies in the Pampa del Tamarugal Aquifer, northern Chile

Elisabeth Lictevout
Universidad de Concepción, Concepción, Chile; and Carpe Science, San Pedro de la Paz, Chile; elisabeth.lictevout@gmail.com

Nicolas Faysse
G-Eau research unit, Cirad, Montpellier University, Montpellier, France; and Asian Institute of Technology, Bangkok , Thailand; faysse@cirad.fr

ABSTRACT: In northern Chile groundwater resources are used intensively for mining activities, drinking water and agriculture. This article analyses the groundwater management in the Pampa del Tamarugal Aquifer, paying special attention to the links between (a) how information relating to groundwater resources and its uses is applied to management and (b) actors’ strategies and discourses on groundwater management. The analysis focuses on two moments: the decision to stop issuing new water rights and the short-lived experience of a regional water resources research centre. Actors never actually discussed an appropriate groundwater pumping rate and some used groundwater resources as a means of pursuing strategies that were not related to water management per se. Many called for a participatory process to allocate water for different uses, although this would entail changes to Chilean legislation. Such a process would help the Pampa del Tamarugal Aquifer become more 'visible' and could trigger genuine discussion about the status and use of groundwater resources.

KEYWORDS: Groundwater management, hydrogeological assessment, Pampa del Tamarugal, Chile

Groundwater governance: The case of the Grootfontein Aquifer at Mahikeng, South Africa

Jude Cobbing
Consulting hydrogeologist, Washington, DC, USA; jcobbing@gmail.com

Cleo Rose-Innes
Economist, Washington, DC, USA; cleoroseinnes@gmail.com

ABSTRACT: This research investigates the case of the Grootfontein Aquifer at Mahikeng. The main aim is to understand why, despite well-established capacity in hydrogeology and progressive groundwater governance rules and practices, groundwater management continues to be poor, with significant deleterious outcomes now and likely in the future. A combination of hydrogeological and institutional analysis reveals a complex set of institutional issues that has inhibited the outcomes anticipated in South African water legislation. The research identifies why conditions are unfavourable for the self-organisation anticipated in the groundwater governance approach that was adopted after 1994, and why actions by specific problem-solving actors are fundamental to the success of this approach. These findings illuminate approaches to economic development that have occurred within the larger public policy context in South Africa since 1994 and find that this has implications for the wider developmental agenda and the political-economic role of the modern African state.

KEYWORDS: Groundwater governance, hydrogeology, Grootfontein Aquifer, common-pool resource, South Africa

Re-introducing politics in African farmer-led irrigation development: Introduction to a Special Issue

Gert Jan Veldwisch
Water Resources Management Group, Wageningen University, Wageningen, the Netherlands; gertjan.veldwisch@wur.nl

Jean-Philippe Venot
UMR G-EAU, IRD, and University of Montpellier, Montpellier, France; Water Resources Management Group, Wageningen University, Wageningen, the Netherlands; and Royal University of Agriculture, Phnom Penh, Cambodia; jean-philippe.venot@ird.fr

Philip Woodhouse
Global Development Institute, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK; phil.woodhouse@manchester.ac.uk

Hans C. Komakech
WISE – Futures: Centre for Water Infrastructure and Sustainable Energy Futures, Nelson Mandela African Institution of Science and Technology, Arusha, Tanzania; hans.komakech@nm-aist.ac.tz

Dan Brockington
Sheffield Institute for International Development, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, UK; d.brockington@sheffield.ac.uk

ABSTRACT: This introduction is a reflexive piece on the notion of farmer-led irrigation development and its politics. It highlights the way the varied contributions to the Special Issue support a shared perspective on farmer-led irrigation development as a process whereby farmers drive the establishment, improvement, and/or expansion of irrigated agriculture, often in interaction with other actors. We analyse how the terminology is used and reproduced, and what it means for our understanding of irrigation policy and practices in sub-Saharan Africa. A central tenet of our argument is that farmer-led irrigation development is inherently political, as it questions the primacy of engineering and other expert knowledges regarding the development of agricultural water use practices in Africa as well as the privileging of formal state planning or technical solutions. We show how mainstream understanding of farmers’ engagement focuses on (1) regulation and control, (2) profitability, and (3) technical efficiency. We demonstrate how these three perspectives have contributed to depoliticised readings of farmer-led irrigation (development), which has been essential to the ability of the terminology to travel and find global allies. Second, we explore the paradox of the invisibility of farmer-led irrigation development in national policies and practices. We discuss practical and political reasons underlying this silence and point out that there are important advantages for irrigators in not being visible. In conclusion we highlight what can be gained from adopting an explicitly political analysis of the processes through which farmers engage in irrigation on their own terms.

KEYWORDS: Irrigation, farmer-led irrigation development, sub-Saharan Africa, irrigation policies, state planning, expert knowledges

Viewpoint – Sustainable and equitable growth in farmer-led irrigation in Sub-Saharan Africa: What will it take?

Nicole Lefore
Texas A & M University, College Station, TX, USA; nicole.lefore@ag.tamu.edu

Meredith Giordano
International Water Management Institute, Colombo, Sri Lanka; meredith.giordano@yahoo.com

Claudia Ringler
International Food Policy Research Institute, Washington, DC; c.ringler@cgiar.org

Jennie Barron
Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU), Uppsala, Sweden; jennie.barron@slu.se

ABSTRACT: The rapid development of farmer-led irrigation is increasing agricultural productivity, incomes, employment and nutrition, but it might well not achieve its full potential. Small-scale irrigators tend to be younger, male and better-off. Women and resource-poor farmers – the majority of farmers in sub-Saharan Africa – are disadvantaged and often excluded from the numerous benefits to be gained from irrigation. Equity in access to water management technologies and practices is constrained by numerous factors, including high investment costs, absence of financial services, poor market integration, inadequate information services, and labour constraints. Lack of institutions for collective management of natural resources, such as water, further restricts access for resource-poor farmers, increasing inequity. In the absence of sustainable natural resources management approaches to agricultural intensification, this situation may become more acute as natural resources become increasingly valuable, and therefore contested. Realising the full potential of farmer-led irrigation requires contextualised policies, institutions and practices to improve equity, markets and sustainability and help ensure that sector growth is inclusive and beneficial.

KEYWORDS: Farmer-led irrigation, agricultural water management, equity, sustainability, sub-Saharan Africa

Gender, water, and nutrition in India: An intersectional perspective

Amit Mitra
Independent Researcher, New Delhi, India; artimtima@gmail.com

Nitya Rao
School of International Development, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK; n.rao@uea.ac.uk

ABSTRACT: Despite the global recognition of women’s central role in the provision, management, and utilisation of water for production and domestic use, and despite the close links between production choices, the security of water for consumption, and gendered social relations, the implications of these interlinkages for health and nutrition are under-explored. This paper seeks to fill this gap. It unpacks the gendered pathways mediating the links between water security in all its dimensions and nutritional outcomes, based on research in 12 villages across two Indian states. The findings point to the importance of the dynamic links between natural (land and water) systems and gendered human activities, across the domains of production and reproduction, and across seasons. These links have implications for women’s work and time burdens. They impact equally on physical and emotional experiences of well-being, especially in contexts constrained by the availability, access, quality, and stability of water.

KEYWORDS: Gender, water, agriculture, nutrition, food security, India

Gender in development discourses of civil society organisations and Mekong hydropower dams

Louis Lebel
Unit for Social and Environmental Research, Science and Technology Research Institute, Chiang Mai University, Chiang Mai, Thailand; Institute of Water Policy, Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore, Singapore; louis@sea-user.org

Phimphakan Lebel
Unit for Social and Environmental Research, Science and Technology Research Institute, Chiang Mai University, Chiang Mai, Thailand; phimphakan@sea-user.org

Kanokwan Manorom
Mekong Sub-region Social Research Center (MSSRC), Faculty of Liberal Arts, Ubon Ratchathani University, Thailand; kanokwan.m@ubu.ac.th

Zhou Yishu
Institute of Water Policy, Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore, Singapore; sppzhou@nus.edu.sg

ABSTRACT: 'Gender in development' discourses are used to justify interventions into, or opposition to, projects and policies; they may also influence perceptions, practices, or key decisions. Four discursive threads are globally prominent: livelihoods and poverty; natural resources and the environment; rights-based; and managerial. Civil society organisations (CSOs) have been vocal in raising awareness about the adverse impacts of large-scale hydropower developments on the environment, on local livelihoods, and on vulnerable groups including women. This discourse analysis first examines how CSOs engaging in hydropower processes in the Mekong Region frame and use gender in development discourses, and then evaluates the potential of these discourses to empower both women and men. Documents authored by CSOs are examined in detail for how gender is represented, as are media reports on CSO activities, interview transcripts, and images. The findings underline how CSOs depend on discursive legitimacy for influence. Their discursive strategies depend on three factors: the organizations’ goals with respect to development, gender, and the environment; whether the situation is pre- or post-construction; and, on their relationships with the state, project developers and dam-affected communities. The implications of these strategies for empowerment are often not straightforward; inadvertent and indirect effects, positive and negative, are common. The findings of this study are of practical value to CSOs wishing to be more reflexive in their work and more responsive to how it is talked about, as it shows the ways that language and images may enhance or inadvertently work against efforts to empower women.

KEYWORDS: Civil society organisations, gender in development, discourse, representation, hydropower

Breaking out of the governance trap in rural Mexico

Antonio Cáñez-Cota
Catedrático CONACYT-CIESAS-CIDIGLO, Guadalajara, Jalisco, México; acanez@conacyt.mx

Nicolás Pineda-Pablos
El Colegio de Sonora, Hermosillo, Sonora, México; npineda@colson.edu.mx

ABSTRACT: The purpose of this study is to explain the governance trap afflicting water agencies of rural municipalities in the Mexican state of Sonora. This trap is based on hierarchical governance arrangements of low complexity that produce a short-term vision. Organisations are isolated from one another, governance mechanisms are closed, and an atmosphere of distrust prevails among stakeholders, resulting in a lack of coordination and the loss of resources, including water. We show how a multiple-use water services scheme can become a governance trap when it allows the over-exploitation of a single source of drinking water by users who do not pay for the service, in locations where the majority of water users have the ability to pay. The study reviews the evidence of two rural regions in Sonora, Mexico. It explains how a past intermunicipal experience failed, and also suggests how a new scheme of intermunicipal authorities could break such governance traps. Specifically, it provides evidence that in small communities, collaborative large-scale arrangements for water governance are more effective than they are in a single municipality. Building governance capacities within and between water agencies and users would thus be advantageous. Although intermunicipal bodies are more complex than traditional arrangements, requiring additional time and resources for decision-making, they result in more sustainable decisions.

KEYWORDS: Governance trap, intermunicipal water authorities, capacity building, water governance, rural regions, Mexico

Decentring watersheds and decolonising watershed governance: Towards an ecocultural politics of scale in the Klamath Basin

Daniel Sarna-Wojcicki
University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA; dsarna@berkeley.edu

Jennifer Sowerwine
University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA; jsowerwi@berkeley.edu

Lisa Hillman
Píkyav Field Institute, Karuk Tribe Department of Natural Resources, Orleans, CA, USA; lisahillman@karuk.us

Leaf Hillman
Karuk Tribe Department of Natural Resources, Orleans, CA, USA; leafhillman@karuk.us

Bill Tripp
Karuk Tribe Department of Natural Resources, Orleans, CA; USA; btripp@karuk.us

ABSTRACT: The watershed has long captured political and scientific imaginations and served as a primary socio-spatial unit of water governance and ecosystem restoration. However, uncritically deploying watersheds for collaborative environmental governance in indigenous territories may inappropriately frame sociocultural, political-economic, and ecological processes, and overlook questions related to power and scale. We analyse how members of the Karuk Tribe’s Department of Natural Resources have leveraged and critiqued collaborative watershed governance initiatives to push for 'ecocultural revitalisation' – the linked processes of ecosystem repair and cultural revitalisation – in Karuk Aboriginal Territory in the Klamath River Basin. We argue for decentring watersheds in relation to other socio-spatial formations that are generated through indigenous-led processes and grounded in indigenous knowledge and values. We explore two scalar frameworks – firesheds and foodsheds – that are emerging as alternatives to the watershed for collaborative natural resources management, and consider their implications for Karuk ecocultural revitalisation. We attempt to bring watersheds, firesheds, and foodsheds together through an ecocultural approach to scale in which water is one among many cultural and natural resources that are interconnected and managed across multiple socio-spatial formations and temporal ranges. We emphasise 'decolonising scale' to foreground indigenous knowledge and to support indigenous sovereignty and self-determination.

KEYWORDS: Watershed governance, Integrated Water Resources Management, politics of scale, tribal sovereignty, Klamath River Basin, California

Hydrosocial territories in dispute: Flows of water and power in an interbasin transfer project in Bolivia

Rígel Rocha Lopez
Andean Centre for Water Management and Use, San Simon University, Cochabamba, Bolivia; rigel.rocha@umss.edu.bo

Rutgerd Boelens
Department of Environmental Sciences, Wageningen University, The Netherlands; Centre for Latin American Research and Documentation, University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands; rutgerd.boelens@wur.nl

Jeroen Vos
Department of Environmental Sciences, Wageningen University, Wageningen, The Netherlands; jeroen.vos@wur.nl

Edwin Rap
Integrated Water Systems & Governance Department, IHE-Delft, The Netherlands; edwin.rap@gmail.com

ABSTRACT: This study of the historical development of the Interbasin Irrigation Water Transfer Project Yungas de Vandiola (Proyecto de Riego Trasvase Yungas de Vandiola, PRTYV) analyses the dynamics of hydrosocial territorialisation pursued by rural communities that aim to strategically claim and create water rights. Starting with the project’s initial design proposal, this article describes the subsequent configurations of alternative hydrosocial territories at three key moments in the project’s development. During this process, groups of communities that were initially not included in the project, changed their hydro-territorial imaginaries and forged multi-scalar alliances in response to wider political and cultural developments at the national level. This altered the dominant imaginary of the legitimate hydrosocial territory for the Yungas de Vandiola irrigation project. The article concludes that interbasin water transfer projects (for irrigation) are arenas of profound hydrosocial territorialisation, as they incorporate new water sources and stakeholders with divergent territorial imaginaries and changing multi-scalar alliances.

KEYWORDS: Irrigation project, hydrosocial territories, territorial imaginaries, water rights, interbasin water transfer, power strategies, Bolivia

Not built to last: Improving legal and institutional arrangements for community-based water and sanitation service delivery in Indonesia

Mohamad Mova Al’Afghani
Center for Regulation, Policy and Governance, Universitas Ibn Khaldun Bogor, Bogor, Indonesia; mova@alafghani.info

Jeremy Kohlitz
Institute for Sustainable Futures – University of Technology Sydney, Ultimo, NSW, Australia; jeremy.kohlitz@uts.edu.au

Juliet Willetts
Institute for Sustainable Futures – University of Technology Sydney, Ultimo, NSW, Australia; juliet.willetts@uts.edu.au

ABSTRACT: The community-based water and sanitation provision model has been widely used since the 1990s, proliferating in Indonesia since 2003. Recently, Indonesia has made plans to achieve universal access to water and sanitation by 2019, primarily by using the community-based model. The model, however, has been criticised with respect to sustainability challenges, the excessive burden it potentially places on communities, and for inadvertently undermining local government engagement in supporting services. This paper analyses the legal and institutional arrangements for community-based water and sanitation delivery in Indonesia, and finds four key issues: (i) absence of legal personality, (ii) lack of asset security, (iii) lack of financial security, and (iv) lack of a service standard. These shortcomings could have implications not only in the long-term use of the infrastructure, but also in terms of human rights. This paper explains that such issues are caused by the prevalent “community empowerment” norm. Instead of a hands-off, post-construction government approach where communities are “left alone”, we propose legal reforms relating to these four areas which are in line with a co-management approach, one in which both the government and the community have responsibilities to support and manage service delivery.

KEYWORDS: Community, institutions, water supply, sanitation, sustainability, Indonesia

The critical geopolitics of water conflicts in school textbooks: The case of Germany

Tobias Ide
Georg Eckert Institute, Braunschweig, Germany; and Department of Geography, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel; ide@gei.de

Anna-Katharina Thiel
Chair of International Relations, University of Braunschweig, Germany; a.thiel@tu-braunschweig.de

Itay Fischhendler
Department of Geography, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel; itay.fishhendler@mail.huji.ac.il

ABSTRACT: A considerable body of critical literature has analysed how scientific discussions on water-conflict links are picked up in the political, academic, economic, civil society and media domains. By contrast, there are almost no such studies for the domain of education. This void is crucial as school attendance rates and the prevalence of environmental education are on the rise, while school education has privileged access to young people during their political socialisation. We address this void by analysing the depiction of water conflicts in school textbooks from a critical geopolitics perspective. More specifically, we use a combination of quantitative and qualitative methods to analyse the visual and textual content of German geography textbooks published between 2000 and 2017. Our findings reveal that the analysed school textbooks securitise water and overstate the risk of water conflicts, which could yield a range of negative societal effects. The textbooks further reproduce Orientalist stereotypes about the Global South, and about the Middle East in particular, and often promote an uncritical green economy stance towards the privatisation of water. Water conflicts are hence discussed in the context of a crisis discourse and reproduce powerful knowledge that privileges certain political interests at the expense of others.

KEYWORDS: Conflict, education, geopolitics, textbooks, water, Germany