Affective hydropolitics: Introduction to the Themed Section

Jenniver Sehring
Department of Water Governance, IHE Delft Institute for Water Education, Delft, The Netherlands; j.sehring@un-ihe.org

Aaron T. Wolf
Oregon State University, Corvallis, USA; aaron.wolf@oregonstate.edu

ABSTRACT: Decision-making and negotiations on transboundary waters are often presented as rational, state-led processes. In that context, 'hydropolitics' refers to the dynamics of interstate relations regarding transboundary water resources, which are analysed at length in the literature. This paper adds a discussion of the (apparently) non-rational components that are more rarely considered: how the governance of international waters is impacted by emotions, spirituality, identity, trust or personal bonds. This introduction surveys the evolution of affective hydropolitics in both academic literature and in practice and recognises that, though these components have always been present in water diplomacy, the positionality of (mostly Western) researchers has precluded their ready assessment. To showcase the multi-level relevance of affective aspects for water politics, we draw on literature from political ecology and international relations. Based on this, we outline some general propositions and (future) research questions on the role of affective aspects in hydropolitics and water diplomacy. The contributions of the themed section show the role of emotion in negotiations between Egypt and Ethiopia over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam and the effect of group identity among representatives of Central Asian countries when mitigating tensions in the Aral Basin. The papers in this section further offer a conceptualisation of trust and trust-building in water diplomacy processes and explore how the personal spirituality of the individuals who negotiate international waters influences their approach. We are hopeful that shining an academic light on the human, emotional (non-rational) factors affecting those engaged in hydropolitics will help deepen our understanding of these critical and complex processes.

KEYWORDS: Water diplomacy, water conflict, water cooperation, emotional turn, decolonial

Trust in transboundary waters: Identifying trust-building in water diplomacy literature

Marko Keskinen
Water & Development Research Group, Aalto University, Espoo, Finland; marko.keskinen@aalto.fi

Elina Häkkinen
Water & Development Research Group, Aalto University, Espoo, Finland; and Finnish Environment Institute (Syke), Helsinki, Finland; hakkinen.elina.a@gmail.com

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

Bota Sharipova
Water Governance department, IHE Delft Institute for Water Education, Delft, The Netherlands; b.sharipova@un-ihe.org

ABSTRACT: Trust-building, one of the key tools in diplomatic negotiations and peace processes, is an essential way to promote cooperation over transboundary waters shared by several countries. Combining water-related know-how with diplomatic mechanisms and foreign policy, water diplomacy provides a particularly relevant context in which to approach trust over transboundary waters. This paper examines trust and trust-building activities in literature related to water diplomacy, linking them to conceptualisations of trust in the fields of international relations and natural resource management. The reviewed publications and key-informant interviews emphasise the importance of trust in water diplomacy processes. The literature and interviews also allow us to identify ten categories of potential trust-building activities in water diplomacy. Based on this, we propose a basic conceptualisation for approaching trust and trust-building in water diplomacy. The findings indicate that, while trust is considered an important element in water diplomacy processes, the discussion would benefit from a more systematic approach. At the same time, water diplomacy processes provide a unique context for studying the role of trust and trust-building in international relations.

KEYWORDS: Water diplomacy, transboundary waters, shared waters, water cooperation, trust, trust-building, international relations, natural resource management

Exploring spirituality in water diplomacy

Sharoma Ramawadh
Independent Researcher, Almere, Netherlands; sharomaramawadh@gmail.com

Diego Jara
International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), Bonn, Germany; diego.jara@iucn.org

Aaron T. Wolf
Oregon State University, Corvallis, USA; aaron.wolf@oregonstate.edu

Jenniver Sehring
Department of Water Governance, IHE Delft Institute for Water Education, The Netherlands; j.sehring@un-ihe.org

ABSTRACT: In the academic literature, the assessment of water diplomacy processes has generally focused on rational factors; some studies, however, have shown that these are not the only driving force in transboundary water negotiations. The role of the affective aspects of transboundary water negotiations is often undervalued and overlooked. Such aspects include emotions, trust, religion, the relationship between body and mind, and the connection with nature. The research presented here explores if and how the spiritual beliefs and practices of individuals engaged in water diplomacy play a role. It builds on a review of the literature on spirituality and engages in qualitative interviews with water diplomats. The conceptualisation of spirituality and water diplomacy is applied to the lived experiences of water diplomacy practitioners in order to assess the role of spiritual beliefs and practices in transboundary negotiations. Fifteen professionals were interviewed about their personal, self-defined spiritual beliefs and practices and the role they perceived them to play in water diplomacy processes. The spiritual practices they identified included meditation, prayers, reading sacred texts, and emotional intelligence practices such as managing emotions (self-management), active listening, effective communication, and self-awareness. The research mainly found that spiritual beliefs and practices can play a role in the preparation of meetings on a personal level, for example through prayers, meditation, and self-centring. During the negotiation process itself, spiritual practices are more implicit and internal. Spiritual practices can provide an alternative to, or can complement, classical approaches to water negotiations. Negotiators’ internal spiritual practice may manifest itself in more positive and/or less reactive negotiation processes. Creating more room for spirituality in the negotiation setting gives negotiators with a spiritual background more opportunity to bring in their spiritual beliefs and practices. This can unlock new ways of negotiating, which can potentially lead to more equity in the allocation of water resources.

KEYWORDS: Spirituality, water diplomacy, water negotiations, spiritual practices, spiritual beliefs

Geographies of infrastructure: Everyday governance of urban water supply beyond the utility network in Dar es Salaam

Francis Dakyaga
Ardhi, University Dar es Salaam, TU-Dortmund, Germany, and SD University of Business and Integrated Development Studies, Ghana, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania; francis.dakyaga@tu-dortmund.de

Sophie Schramm
International Planning Studies (IPS), TU-Dortmund, Germany, Dortmund, Germany; sophie.schramm@tu-dortmund.de

John. M. Lupala
Department of Urban and Regional Planning, Ardhi University, Dar es Salaam, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania; johnlupala@yahoo.com

Dawah Lulu Magembe-Mushi
Department of Urban and Regional Planning, Ardhi University, Dar es Salaam, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania; dimushi2000@yahoo.com

ABSTRACT: Due to uneven networked water coverage in the Global South, varied water infrastructures operate beyond utility networks to serve denizens in Global South cities. This study proposes a framework of governance modalities, actors, and interactions to analyse the governance of heterogeneous non-network water infrastructures in Dar es Salaam. This framework builds on existing literature on urban water infrastructure, everyday practices, and governance. The paper demonstrates the coexistence of private water networks, self-supply systems, and communal and hydro-mobile infrastructure that enable water collection beyond utilities. Multiple governance modalities, including co-production, self-governance, market-oriented governance, co-governance, and networked governance, control these infrastructures. Hybrid governance arrangements produce interdependent infrastructures that challenge utility’s efforts by supplying water to suburbs beyond the utility’s pipes. However, diverse actors and powers, conflicting responsibilities, and (in)formal regulatory mechanisms are still embodied in these modalities. This can result in (un)even water distribution among urbanites and across urban spaces.

KEYWORDS: (In)formality, heterogeneous infrastructure, governance, Dar es Salaam, Global South

Central Asian water neighbourhood: A constructivist reconceptualisation of hydropolitics in Central Asia

Timur Dadabaev
Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities, University of Tsukuba, Japan; dadabaev.timur.gm@u.tsukuba.ac.jp

Jenniver Sehring
Water Governance and Diplomacy, IHE Delft Institute for Water Education, Delft; The Netherlands; j.sehring@un-ihe.org

Nigora Djalilova
Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities, University of Tsukuba, Japan; d.nigora@gmail.com

ABSTRACT: Transboundary water conflict and cooperation are often conceptualised through the premises of national sovereignty and national interests, which leads to transboundary collaboration being perceived as detrimental to (rational) sovereign state interests. For Central Asia, this perspective has led to a preoccupation by Western, rationalist IR theorists with conflict scenarios that have not occurred. In this paper, we apply a constructivist approach to understanding Central Asian hydropolitics and relate it to the discussion of emotional aspects of international relations. We do so through an analysis of the interconnection between the ideas of 'neighbourhood' and 'nationhood' in Central Asia, through the notions of brotherhood/fraternity and informal collective decision-making for joint water management. These two aspects can explain why – even in years of political tensions and heated rhetoric around water – an understanding persisted that water issues cannot be approached or resolved through violence or one-sided actions, and (informal) cooperation contributed to conflict prevention. Based on a review of four phases of hydropolitics in Central Asia, we elaborate the notion of a regional 'water neighbourhood' to show that Western, rationalist conceptualisations of state and interstate relations fall short of explaining the different realities of transboundary water relations around the world.

KEYWORDS: Hydropolitics, water management, Central Asia, constructivism, regional identity

Emotions in water diplomacy: Negotiations on the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam

Wondwosen Michago Seide
Lund University, Lund, Sweden; wondwosen.seide@svet.lu.se

Emanuele Fantini
Water Governance Department, IHE Delft Institute for Water Education, Delft, the Netherlands; Department of Human Geography, Planning and International Development Studies, University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands; e.fantini@un-ihe.org

ABSTRACT: This paper aims to foreground the importance of emotions in water diplomacy in general and in Nile water diplomacy in particular. Water diplomacy does not operate from a clean slate, but in a socio-hydropolitically mediated context which is, in turn, imbued with emotions. The existing water diplomacy approach primarily operates with the assumption that the riparian state is a rational actor. However, we argue that emotions have underpinned water diplomacy, including the ongoing Nile negotiations. These emotions are neither acknowledged nor negotiated but are dismissed as irrationality in both the theoretical understanding and practice of water diplomacy. The Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) has been a bone of contention between, and evoked deep emotions in, Ethiopia and Egypt. Even if they are often unacknowledged by water policy makers, diplomats, and engineers in negotiations on how to fill and operate the GERD, these actors are inevitably negotiating emotions such as fear of water insecurity, anger over water injustice, harm aversion, impact minimisation, and threat diffusion. Conclusions point to the understanding of emotions as one important element influencing the process and outcome of water negotiations in general and on the Nile River in particular. To achieve effective cooperation among riparian states, an assessment of the issues’ emotional impacts may be necessary.

KEYWORDS: Emotions, water diplomacy, negotiations, Nile River, GERD, Ethiopia, Egypt

Viewpoint – Seeing like a farmer – How irrigation policies may undermine farmer-led irrigation in Sub-Saharan Africa

Annelieke Duker
IHE Delft, Institute for Water Education, Delft, the Netherlands; a.duker@un-ihe.org

ABSTRACT: State and non-state support for farmer-led irrigation can help resource-poor farmers and mitigate adverse social and environmental impacts. However, emerging farmer-led irrigation policies are usually based on assumptions, objectives, and approaches that do not match with many farmer realities. As a result, farmer-led irrigation policies may stifle farmers’ initiatives and the distinctive strengths of these irrigation ventures. Based on two key learnings from studies on farmer-led irrigation in Kenya and Zimbabwe, this viewpoint explores how external interventions may adversely affect irrigation development. First, farmer-led irrigation is characterised by a high degree of farmer autonomy, dynamism, and flexibility. Therefore, farmer-led ventures can fail and struggle, and learning and progress are a result of this autonomy. Embedding often-informal initiatives in formal structures can smother the autonomous and/or entrepreneurial character of farmer-led irrigation. Second, farmers’ aspirations and needs do not always reflect a market-oriented and long-term engagement in irrigation. Dominant frames of commercialising farmer-led irrigation may therefore fail to accommodate the diverse needs of farming households. Interventions may be most meaningful when they recognize, build on, and support diverse aspirations of rural households, aimed at promoting their livelihoods and resilience without promoting specific technologies or pathways. This requires a shift in planning beyond technocratic irrigation discourses of market orientation and water efficiency and productivity.

KEYWORDS: Farmer-led irrigation, policy, development interventions, livelihoods, sub-Saharan Africa

Immaterial infrastructures and conflict in the Salween River Basin

Stew Motta
IVM, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam, the Netherlands; s.e.a.motta@vu.nl

Aaron T. Wolf
College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR, USA; wolfa@geo.oregonstate.edu

E. Lisa F. Schipper
Geography Department, University of Bonn, Bonn, Germany; lschipper@uni-bonn.de

ABSTRACT: This paper historicises Burmese and Thai efforts to cooperate around hydraulic infrastructure construction in the conflictual Salween landscape. Transboundary water governance literature focuses on the material or physical changes in river flows or in upstream and downstream governance dynamics that are caused by infrastructure. This study enhances understandings of water conflict and cooperation by tracing how immaterial infrastructure can increase conflict dynamics at potential Salween project sites even before any concrete has been poured. Hydraulic infrastructure is used in its immaterial forms to restructure the landscape and international relations. The Burmese military or 'Sit Tat' uses such projects as an 'illiberal signal' to convey future political intentions to international partners. The immaterial infrastructures hold together securitised elite alliances that obtain legitimacy and foreign reserves for the Sit Tat in exchange for future resource extraction profits. Mirumachi’s TWINS model (Transboundary Water Interaction NexuS) is used to highlight moments of infrastructure intentions that simultaneously increase violence and conflict without changes to the river’s hydrology. This paper shows how international cooperation around megaprojects keeps Salween communities in cycles of violence and dispossession for decades, even at project sites where infrastructure has yet to be constructed.

KEYWORDS: Hydropolitics, immaterial infrastructure, conflict, environmental justice, Myanmar, Thailand

Echoes of the Okavango Delta – Does the voice of the people matter?

Anand Datla
Texas A&M, College Station, USA; adatla@tamu.edu

Susanne Schmeier
IHE Delft Institute for Water Education, Delft, the Netherlands; s.schmeier@un-ihe.org

Gabriela Cuadrado-Quesada
IHE Delft Institute for Water Education, Delft, the Netherlands; g.quesada@un-ihe.org

Ronald Mothobi
Okavango Research Institute, Maun, Botswana; rmothobi@ub.ac.bw

ABSTRACT: Water governance in a shared basin features a complex array of actors operating at one or many scales, whose knowledge, practices, and authority inform and influence that governance. These relationships can be particularly complex in water systems that form part of a transboundary river system, as is the case with the Okavango Delta. The article discusses the persistent challenges of water access faced by community members in the Delta. Water governance in the Delta has been studied from various disciplinary perspectives; still, the experiences of local communities at the layer nearest to the water resources remain a topic of significant interest. Our research takes an integrated approach combining concepts of scales, institutions, and power. This article is based on a literature review and a qualitative empirical field study; the study found that communities in the Delta complain about persistent experiences of constrained access and limited influence in matters related to water governance. We also observe that the state is entangled in policy and practice at various scales, often appropriating power at the expense of those institutions and mechanisms designed to address the needs of the local community. Our study shows that the exercise of power by formal institutions in the Delta tends to undermine informal institutions, compromising the ability of some community members to participate effectively in water governance processes.

KEYWORDS: Water governance, scales, critical institutionalism, power, community participation, Okavango Delta, Botswana

The illusion of the container based sanitation solution: Lessons from Khayelitsha, South Africa

Mmeli Dube
University of the Western Cape, Cape Town, South Africa; a.l.mdee@leeds.ac.uk

Fiona Anciano
University of the Western Cape, Cape Town, South Africa; fanciano@uwc.ac.za

Anna Mdee
School of Politics & International Studies, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK; a.l.mdee@leeds.ac.uk

ABSTRACT: Container Based Sanitation (CBS) is seen, by some, as a sustainable sanitation 'solution' for informal settlements. Presented as a cost-effective form of improved, safely managed, affordable, and water-saving sanitation, proponents argue that it not only enhances safety for vulnerable groups, but that it can also be funded through innovative market and circular economy solutions. The City of Cape Town (CoCT) provides CBS on a large scale to informal settlements for free. Yet residents are notoriously unhappy with CBS. This paper is based on two years of fieldwork in BM Section, Khayelitsha, Cape Town, which included transect walks, participant observation, engagement with community leaders and civil society activists, and in-depth interviews with 42 respondents including BM Section residents, City of Cape Town officials, and private sector contractors. The paper applies the concept of infrastructural citizenship to examine the provision of Portable Flush Toilets (PFTs), a form of CBS, in Khayelitsha. Our data reveals conflicted views in relation to the (non)adoption of CBS, which are deeply entwined with frustration at the unmet promises of the post-apartheid state. At face value, CBS in Cape Town is an acceptable and successful form of sanitation for informal settlements. However, this paper suggests that this is an illusion. Our case study reveals that PFTs are experienced as neither a dignified nor a sustainable sanitation solution. This paper shifts the debate surrounding the adequacy and nature of sanitation provision in informal settlements, from focusing on material technological systems to the complexity of sanitation-related infrastructural citizenship.

KEYWORDS: Sanitation, Container-Based Sanitation (CBS), Portable Flush Toilets (PFTs), informal settlement, infrastructural citizenship, infrastructural violence, off-grid, Cape Town, South Africa

The water frontier: Agribusiness vs. smallholder communities in the Brazilian Cerrado

Ludivine Eloy
ART-Dev, Univ Montpellier, CIRAD, CNRS, Université de Perpignan, Université Paul Valéry, Montpellier, France; ludivine.eloy@univ-montp3.fr

Andréa Leme da Silva
Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte, Natal, Brazil; andrea.leme@ufrn.br

Osmar Coelho Filho
Graduate Program in Environmental Technology and Water Resources, University of Brasilia, Brasília, Brazil; mc2sustentavel@gmail.com

Stéphane Ghiotti
ART-Dev, Univ Montpellier, CIRAD, CNRS, Université de Perpignan, Université Paul Valéry, Montpellier, France; stephane.ghiotti@univ-montp3.fr

ABSTRACT: Agro-industrial expansion in the Brazilian savannas (the Cerrado) is associated with deforestation and land conflicts, but its relationship with water issues remains under-studied. Drawing on the basin trajectory approach, we explore the transformations in water usage and water policies over the past 20 years, as well as the divergent explanations for water scarcity in the Corrente River watershed (western Bahia). We identify a process of basin closure: Soybean farmers exploit growing volumes of surface and groundwater for centre-pivot irrigation, while, in smallholder communities located downstream from the plantations, long-established gravitational irrigation systems are declining. The volume of water licensed to agro-industrial companies grew by 431% between 2013 and 2021. During a phase of 'water abundance' and poor hydrological knowledge, water pumping relied on the deregulation of state environmental policy. Since the water scarcity phase, starting in 2015, the irrigator-farmer group has had to face growing protest from social movements and warnings from the scientific community. Its narrative, focused on climate change and the spatial dislocation of the problem (from upstream to downstream), helps to disclaim responsibility for water scarcity. This controversy over the causes of water scarcity, added to the fragility of instruments of social participation, may explain why supply augmentation is still the main response of the state for coping with basin closure.

KEYWORDS: Water licenses, water scarcity, soybean frontier, irrigated agriculture, environmental narratives, river basin trajectory, Brazilian Cerrado, Brazil

Dam removal politics and unlikely alliances in the lower Snake River Basin

Krista Harrington
Oregon State University, Corvallis, United States of America; krista.harrington@oregonstate.edu

Alida Cantor
Portland State University, Portland, United States of America; acantor@pdx.edu

ABSTRACT: Dams, once considered catalysts for economic development in the Western US, are now being targeted for removal due to their adverse ecological and social outcomes. However, dam removal often remains controversial. In the Pacific Northwest, four dams on the Lower Snake River have long been criticized for their negative impacts on salmon. In 2021, the Columbia Basin Initiative was proposed, seeking to dismantle the dams in order to simultaneously improve salmon health, redesign Idaho’s energy landscape, change transportation pathways, and protect other dams. Response to the initiative has been polarized. In this paper, we build upon political ecology and ‘unlikely alliance’ scholarship by examining the reactions to and points of tension around the initiative. We specifically focus on the viewpoints of key stakeholders who have shifted from their historically rooted alliances and views. We found that being in favour of dam removal in general was not necessarily enough to cause someone to support the Columbia Basin Initiative (and vice versa). In particular, stakeholders were split on views around legal provisions in the initiative that would limit the future utility of current environmental law. We contribute to political ecology and unlikely alliance scholarship by demonstrating that dam removal is a complex issue that can bring actors together in unanticipated ways.

KEYWORDS: Water governance, collaborative governance, unlikely alliances, salmon, dam removal, Snake River, Pacific Northwest, USA

Spring-based irrigation in Battir, Palestine: A locus of social agency in the face of hydro-hegemony

Kholoud D. Nasser
Birzeit University, Ramallah, Palestine; kholoud.nasser3@gmail.com

ABSTRACT: This article discusses the agricultural use of springs as a socio-ecological and everyday matter in the context of structural colonial control over water. It examines how Israel’s strategies interfere with the local politics around water. It also investigates how rural communities collectively deploy agency through implementing traditional spring-based irrigation as a 'common' system, and also through ecotourism as a way of building solidarity. As a case study, the article focuses on the village of Battir, which is located on the western edge of the West Bank highlands. The paper utilises ethnographic and qualitative tools for data collection. From an interdisciplinary perspective, the study tries to bridge the theoretical and empirical approaches of water research. It brings insights from political ecology into conversation with social theories of practice. Its aim is to analyse how people exert agency and navigate their actions while immersed in a struggle to define their lives according to their needs. The analysis takes place in the context of the settler colonial condition. The article underlines the role of local practices in water resource management as a counter-hegemonic act in the face of colonial expansion and hydro-hegemony and as a bottom-up approach to enhancing local development, bringing stability to the social field, and strengthening resilience.

KEYWORDS: Hydro-hegemony, irrigation commons, agency, somoud, settler colonialism, Palestinian highlands, springs, Palestine

The role of small-scale hydraulic infrastructure in transforming hydrosocial territories in a catchment in Ceará, Brazil

Hela Gasmi
Federal University of Ceará; Research Institute for Meteorology and Water Resources (FUNCEME), Fortaleza, Brazil; Montpellier University, UMR G-Eau, CIRAD, L’Institut Agro, Montpellier, France; hela.gasmi@hotmail.com

Letícia de Freitas Vieira
Research Institute for Meteorology and Water Resources (FUNCEME), Fortaleza, Brazil; leticiageoufc@gmail.com

Marcel Kuper
University of Montpellier, Cirad, UMR G-Eau, Montpellier, France; kuper@cirad.fr

Eduardo Sávio Passos Rodrigues Martins
Research Institute for Meteorology and Water Resources (FUNCEME) , Fortaleza, Brazil; espr.martins@gmail.com

Julien Burte
University of Montpellier, Cirad, UMR G-Eau, Montpellier, France; julien.burte@cirad.fr

ABSTRACT: This paper analyses the central role of water infrastructure in the transformation of hydrosocial territories through a case study in the Forquilha catchment in Brazil’s Nordeste. Decentralised state-led infrastructural development reinforced the resilience of communities to drought, leading to more sustainable water access by many families; this was further magnified through individual and collective initiatives. However, this entailed the overdevelopment of small-scale hydraulic infrastructure and the formation of small community-based hydrosocial territories, which changed water flows and social relations at different scales. We show how this has led to the loss of hydraulic connectivity and the fragmentation of the catchment and how it has weakened collective action vis-à-vis the state. The state staged a remarkable interventionist comeback in the catchment by connecting medium-sized reservoirs in the upstream part of the catchment to urban water supply networks. In the absence of negotiated water reallocation, this may lead to the loss of water and livelihoods by vulnerable groups.

KEYWORDS: Fragmentation, dispossession, resilience, hydrosocial territories, Nordeste, Brazil

More collectives, less differences: Unveiling unexpected social changes in a groundwater economy in the Middle Atlas, Morocco

Zakia Kchikech
Moulay Ismail University, Meknes, Morocco; zakia0105@gmail.com

Zhour Bouzidi
Moulay Ismail University, Meknes, Morocco; z.bouzidi@umi.ac.ma

Nicolas Faysse
G-Eau Research Unit, CIRAD, University of Montpellier, France; University of Carthage, National Agronomic Institute of Tunisia (INAT); faysse@cirad.fr

ABSTRACT: Access to the groundwater economy has frequently enabled an economic boom but is also believed to increase inequalities between farmers. The present study analyses social changes in a rural community as it entered and evolved in a groundwater economy, and today increasingly has to cope with groundwater depletion. The case study was conducted in the Middle Atlas region of Morocco, where marked social, economic and political differences habitually separated ethnic fractions. Farmers created several collectives to access groundwater resources and support the marketing of newly irrigated crops. Thanks to this new groundwater economy, the social and economic positions of previously marginalised fractions caught up with those of the historically favoured fractions. The basis on which farmers’ collectives were organised had evolved and crossed lines between ethnic fractions. The social configurations at local level, which are often considered to influence agrarian change and actors’ relations concerning water resources, actually evolve with them. These configurations have a major influence on the dynamics of farmers’ collectives. Therefore, paying attention to evolving social configurations at local level is important if the aim is to involve farmers’ collectives in the search for governance models to achieve sustainable groundwater use.

KEYWORDS: Collective action, groundwater economy, inequalities, social configurations, Morocco

Freedoms ebb and flow: Boaters’ experiences of water and sanitation insecurity on the inland waterways of England and Wales

Ruth Sylvester
University of Leeds, School of Civil Engineering, Leeds, UK; cnres@leeds.ac.uk

Helen Underhill
Newcastle University, School of Architecture, Planning & Landscape, Newcastle, UK; helen.underhill@newcastle.ac.uk

ABSTRACT: This article explores how boat dwellers on the inland waterways of England and Wales – 'Boaters' – experience water and sanitation services. Boating populations are not counted as customers of private water utilities, so they exist within the 'dwelling paradox' and are positioned at greater risk of water and sanitation insecurity. Interviews and auto-ethnography document a myriad of ways in which participants use these resources on different vessels and waterways. The Capability Approach emerges as an apt framework for representing nuanced journeys from water and sanitation access to perceived quality of life. Findings suggest that equitable services can be defined as those which enable Boaters to live in ways they value. This entails reckoning with diverse – and potentially divergent – definitions of a 'good life', supported by the personal freedoms to achieve it. We argue this research makes a strong case for centring lived experiences in service design, particularly in instances of disagreement on the constitution of adequate service levels. Co-creating knowledge with people living in the dwelling paradox reveals complex relationships with authority and exclusion. We extend this theory, and the principles of equitable service delivery, to emphasise the situated desires, choices, and freedoms of the populations in question.

KEYWORDS: Water and sanitation, dwelling paradox, Capability Approach, health, wellbeing, canals, rivers, itinerant dwelling, household water insecurity, United Kingdom

Analysing the evolution of water governance models in Indonesia through the Economies of Worth framework

Héloïse Valette
LISST, Université Toulouse 2 Jean Jaurès, Toulouse, France; heloise.valette@univ-tlse2.fr

ABSTRACT: The water governance model that currently dominates at the international level is based on the principles of the Dublin Conference (1992), one of which asserts that water is an economic good. Faced with growing environmental issues as well as increased demand for recognition of water as a human right or as a common good, this model is being contested both in international arenas and at national or local levels. This article aims to examine the justification discourses used by actors who either challenge or reinforce the dominant model. The focus is on water qualification issues, which we argue have a significant impact on policymaking and the renewal of water governance models. We employ the Economies of Worth framework (Boltanski and Thévenot, 1991) not only to decipher which values actors resort to when qualifying water – as a human right, an economic good, or a social good, for example – but also to understand the reasons why one qualification prevails over others in water-related debates. We examine these debates in the Indonesian context, where many disputes arising from water qualification have occurred, the 'tests of worth' in Boltanski and Thévenot’s framework. Using a qualitative methodology, we conducted semi-structured interviews and reviewed legislation and operational documents to explore three such tests of worth. Our case study reveals the persistence of the governance model that promotes water as an economic good, despite extensive debate and new regulations that may have strengthened a model based on the qualification of water as a human right.

KEYWORDS: Water qualification, Economies of Worth, water governance model, justification, discourse, Indonesia

A street view of groundwater policymaking and management in Azraq, Jordan

Hoor Al-Amin
IHE Delft Institute for Water Education, Amman, Jordan; alamin.hoor@gmail.com

Jaap Evers
Water Governance Department, IHE Delft – Institute for Water Education, Delft, The Netherlands; j.evers@un-ihe.org

Leon M. Hermans
Land and Water Management Department, IHE Delft; and Faculty of Technology, Policy and Management, Delft University of Technology, Delft, the Netherlands, l.hermans@un-ihe.org / l.m.hermans@tudelft.nl

ABSTRACT: Groundwater management is a complex task that includes a multitude of actors. It is even more complicated in water scarce countries with less well-established formal water governance structures. In these settings, local government officers have been recognised for their essential role in groundwater management. Often, their role is described as problematic, with officers being under-resourced, under-motivated and, at times, corrupt. In this paper we zoom in on these street-level bureaucrats in Azraq, one of the most depleted groundwater basins in Jordan. Based on inputs from officers, farmers, and sector experts, we collate and analyse information on how the settings in which local officers work influence their day-to-day implementation of policies. We observe that officers in Azraq are heavily influenced by the context in which they operate. This context is characterised by the physical scarcity of groundwater, the formal policy setting, and the presence of the shadow state. The context shapes local officers’ relationships with farmers, their own personal beliefs and subjectivities, and their capacity and resources. As a result, their divergent actions arguably become the groundwater management policy. Based on these findings, we argue that a deeper understanding is needed of the underlying factors and drivers that shape local groundwater management if we are to arrive at better groundwater policy for a more sustainable future.

KEYWORDS: Groundwater management, street-level bureaucrats, policymaking, shadow state, Jordan

Water factories of the high Colombian mountains: Páramo as 'infrastructural nature'

Santiago Martínez Medina
Universidad el Bosque, Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Bogotá, Colombia; santiagommo@gmail.com

Hanne Cottyn
History Department, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium; hanne.cottyn@ugent.be

Ana María Garrido
University of Florida, Gainesville, USA; am.garrido15@gmail.com

Joshua Kirshner
Department of Environment and Geography, University of York, York, UK; joshua.kirshner@york.ac.uk

Rory O’Bryen
Faculty of Modern & Medieval Languages & Linguistics, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK; rro20@cam.ac.uk

ABSTRACT: Páramo is a term imported from Spain to the northern Andes to refer to uninhabited, barren, mountainous areas. This notion has, in more recent times, acquired new meanings. Today, the páramo is known as a high mountain tropical ecosystem of strategic importance to carbon storage, water provision, and biodiversity. In Colombia, the páramos located around Bogotá have been central in the emergence and consolidation of conceptualisations of the páramo as a strategic ecosystem. In close relation to their importance for the country’s first large-scale water infrastructures to supply urbanizing populations, they are today imagined as fábricas de agua, or 'water factories'. In this article, we propose the notion of 'double support' to capture the coordinated work between water intake from the páramo and environmental conservation of the páramo as a situated articulation of the concept of 'infrastructural nature'. We trace the emergence of the páramo as infrastructural nature through two partly overlapping trajectories of what we define as 'infrastructuralisation', the first driven by the work of water engineers, the second materialising in the work of natural scientists. While these trajectories do not exhaust the complex historical process that gives rise to the “páramo as we know it today”, they do allow us to grasp contemporary understandings of the páramo as a “marriage of convenience”, whose stability should not be taken for granted.

KEYWORDS: páramo, infrastructure, water, nature conservation, Colombia

Beyond anthropocentrism: Water law and environmental management in the Yellowstone River Basin, USA

Nicolas T. Bergmann
Department of Crop and Soil Sciences, Washington State University, Pullman, USA, nicolas.bergmann@wsu.edu; and Department of Natural Resources and Society, University of Idaho, Moscow, USA; nbergmann@uidaho.edu

ABSTRACT: Recent cross-fertilisation among the fields of critical legal geography, political ecology and environmental ethics has created opportunities to examine new legal designations for more-than-human entities such as rivers. In particular, theorisations of how more-than-human assemblages ontologically co-constitute the law challenge interpretations of legal structures as purely human creations and encourage scholars to examine manifestations of non-anthropocentrism, which is defined here as an ethical position that elevates non-humans’ moral standing to that of humans. This article adopts an historical case study approach to examine an environmental conflict that occurred in the 1970s involving non-anthropocentrism and Montana water law. Specifically, this article draws from critical legal geography’s understanding of the law and the environment as being co-constituted to argue that both elements of a non-anthropocentric environmental ethic and the influence of Yellowstone River as a more-than-human entity shaped Montana Fish and Game’s position during the Yellowstone River Basin water reservation process. This article further argues that the combination of these influences affected legal interpretation of the 1973 Montana Water Use Act’s 'minimum stream flow' text and helped reconstitute the Act to include non-anthropocentric elements.

KEYWORDS: Legal geography, political ecology, water governance, more-than-human geography, environmental ethics, Yellowstone River, USA