Submitted by Bruna Rodrigues (bruna92rodrigues@yahoo.com.br) on 2016-10-13T14:27:48Z No. of bitstreams: 1 TeseRFE.pdf: 2082252 bytes, checksum: 2b1398d3c92e4d76f1635e39b574ffc4 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Marina Freitas (marinapf@ufscar.br) on 2016-10-21T13:49:51Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 TeseRFE.pdf: 2082252 bytes, checksum: 2b1398d3c92e4d76f1635e39b574ffc4 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Marina Freitas (marinapf@ufscar.br) on 2016-10-21T13:49:56Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 TeseRFE.pdf: 2082252 bytes, checksum: 2b1398d3c92e4d76f1635e39b574ffc4 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-10-21T13:50:00Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 TeseRFE.pdf: 2082252 bytes, checksum: 2b1398d3c92e4d76f1635e39b574ffc4 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2016-07-07 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES) / Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP) / This work aims to characterize the discursive production of the World Water Council, an entity created in 1996 in order to set a plataform for the international debate on water. For this task, we will build, from the discourse plan and the socio-historical context, an analysis of the Environment Conferences and Water Conference as well as the documents and reports published by the Council devoted to the subject. Therefore, the methodological procedures adopted are documentary research, literature review and semi-structured interviews. In conceptual level, this research is supported by the post-colonial and decolonial framework. From this perspective, we have as main objective to analyze the possible impacts of colonialism in the discursive production on the environmental issue, especially in arguments built by the Council. We will be guided by the following hypothesis: the contours that characterize the boundaries of environmental issues are guided by a logic of coloniality of being, knowing and power, thus promoting a theme of entrapment in a discriminatory and hierarchical structure of the world. / Este trabalho visa caracterizar a produção discursiva do Conselho Mundial da Água, entidade criada em 1996 com o objetivo de abrigar, de maneira ampla, o debate internacional sobre a água. Para tal tarefa, realizaremos, a partir do plano do discurso e do contexto sócio-histórico, uma análise das conferências sobre Meio Ambiente e sobre a água, bem como dos documentos e relatórios publicados pelo Conselho dedicados ao tema. Portanto, como procedimentos metodológicos foram adotados a pesquisa documental, revisão bibliográfica e realização de entrevistas semi-estruturadas. Em nível conceitual a pesquisa estará sustentada pelo referencial pós-colonial e decolonial. Sob esta perspectiva crítica proposta, o objetivo geral foi analisar os possíveis impactos da colonialidade na produção discursiva sobre a questão ambiental, em especial nas argumentações construídas pelo Conselho. A pesquisa é orientada pela seguinte hipótese: os contornos que caracterizam as fronteiras da questão ambiental estão orientados por uma lógica de colonialidade do ser, do saber e do poder, promovendo assim, um enclausuramento do tema em uma estrutura discriminatória e hierarquizada do mundo.

Water scarcity and water contamination are persistent problems facing large numbers of people in India. In order to combat scarcity, the Indian Federal government designated 2016 to be the Year of Water Conservation. In order to prepare for the success of this initiative, different management strategies and awareness campaigns began in 2015. Critics have generally responded favourably to these shifts in water management because conservation is considered a benevolent and even environmentally-friendly, or “green” process that can successfully combat water scarcity. However, these initiatives often change the ways in which people access water based upon new governing mentalities. The governing mentality most strongly underpinning these initiatives is based on a neoliberal rationality, which is generally admonished by academics and activists due to the production of uneven socio-economic landscapes under neoliberal economics. Similarly, in an effort to combat water contamination, governing authorities have initiated programs and policies to ensure that safe water is provided for citizens. However, this too has often been influenced by neoliberal governing mentalities. In order to analyze these shifts, this dissertation takes a closer look at the narratives of water conservation, water scarcity, and water contamination using a political ecology framework in three states in North Western India: Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, and Haryana. The following manuscript style thesis consists of five independent papers, plus an introduction and conclusion, linked thematically through the discussion and analyses of the shifting nature of the hydro-social cycle under the pressure of various neoliberal reforms and processes initiated by federal and state governing authorities in North Western India. Having independent papers lends itself to a more nuanced discussion of the ways in which neoliberal water management strategies are lived-out in various communities. Neoliberalism is not an overarching hegemonic project or phenomenon, and as such the discourses of neoliberalism have had different consequences for different communities and populations. As such, this thesis highlights the ways in which the shifting hydro-social cycle has changed gender-related activities of water collection, the ways in which contamination is a form of slow violence, the ways in which defacto public-private partnerships operate in water scarce urban centres, and the ways in which discourses of conservation can be misleading and even manufactured. / Graduate / 2019-05-23

abstract: Research shows that many water governance regimes are failing to guide social-ecological systems away from points, beyond which, damage to social and environmental well-being will be difficult to correct. This problem is apparent in regions that face water conflicts and climate threats. There remains a need to clarify what is it about governance that people need to change in water conflict prone regions, how to collectively go about doing that, and how research can actively support this. To address these needs, here I present a collaborative research project from the dry tropics of Guanacaste Province, Costa Rica. The project addressed the overarching questions: How can water be governed sustainably in water-contested and climate-threatened regions? And, how can people transition current water governance regimes toward more sustainable ones? In pursuit of these questions, a series of individual studies were performed with many partners and collaborators. These studies included: a participatory analysis and sustainability assessment of current water governance regimes; a case analysis and comparison of water conflicts; constructing alternative governance scenarios; and, developing governance transition strategies. Results highlight the need for water governance that addresses asymmetrical knowledge gaps especially concerning groundwater resources, reconciles disenfranchised groups, and supports local leaders. Yet, actions taken based on these initial results, despite some success influencing policy, found substantial challenges confronting them. In-depth conflict investigations, for example, found that deeply rooted issues such friction between opposing local-based and national institutions were key conflict drivers in the region. To begin addressing these issues, researchers and stakeholders then constructed a set of governing alternatives and devised governance transition strategies that could actively support people to achieve more sustainable alternatives and avoid less sustainable ones. These efforts yielded insight into the collective actions needed to implement more sustainable water governance regimes, including ways to overcoming barriers that drive harmful water conflicts. Actions based on these initial strategies yielded further opportunities, challenges, and lessons. Overall, the project addresses the research and policy gap between identifying what is sustainable water governance and understanding the strategies needed to implement it successfully in regions that experience water conflict and climate impacts. / Dissertation/Thesis / Ph.D. Sustainability 2014

The aim of this study was to develop a framework that makes explicit some of the core norms and indicators of hydrosolidarity and to assess whether regional and basin-level multilateral water regimes in SADC are able to promote and apply the identified norms and indicators. This is a relevant aim given that water availability and provision is a challenge in this water scarce region. This is further complicated by the reality that transboundary water contains 68 percent of the area of the SADC region; it provides for 74 percent of the region’s people and constitutes 91 percent of the available surface water resources in the region. In a region where fresh water is both fundamentally scarce and shared, it becomes critical to best govern water so as to respond to the needs of water-related ecosystems which transcend political boundaries as well as the complex spectrum of social actors and forces that place demands on the resource. Hydrosolidarity is a concept that aims to respond to this challenge. The concept has not, however, been distilled into a framework for analysing the effectiveness of transboundary water governance. Also, International Relations (IR) has extensive scholarship on the closely related ideas of cooperation, regimes and international organisations. This literature has not, however, been systematically linked to a framework for analysing whether water regimes can deliver on the indicators of hydrosolidarity. This context gives rise to a core research question which focused on the extent to which SADC Water Sector (WS) (a regional water regime) and the Orange-Senqu River Basin 214 Commission (ORASECOM) (a basin level water regime) can foster hydrosolidarity in Southern Africa. The assumption and thesis statement is that water regimes in SADC offer a partial promotion of hydrosolidarity by developing cooperative institutional structures that allow for the development of norms and standards of behaviour, but are not able to create enhanced integration and linkages beyond the water sector or to deal with issues relating to holistic stakeholder participation. This research question is unpacked through four subquestions. The first question considers the extent to which hydrosolidarity contributes to an understanding of an ideal for transboundary water governance. The second analyses whether water regimes can foster hydrosolidarity. The third considers if regional and basinlevel water regimes exist in SADC, and if so, how they manifest. The last considers whether SADC WS and ORASECOM do actually foster hydrosolidarity in practise. The task of developing a theoretical framework for analysing hydrosolidarity in a transboundary context results in a set of norms and indicators being clarified. The norms of hydrosolidarity include cooperation and solidarity, equity, inclusivity, promotion of human well-being and environmental sustainability around transboundary waters. Linked to these norms are a set of indicators that can be used to identify and work towards hydrosolidarity. These include striving for shared knowledge about transboundary rivers, enhanced integration and linkages between relevant actors, issue areas and governance structures, organisational structures for fostering transboundary water governance, stakeholder involvement in transboundary water governance processes, and development of a normative framework for transboundary water governance. These norms and indicators are also systematically linked to the characteristics and functions of multilateral water regimes. When applying this framework to the two case study areas, it emerges that SADC WS and ORASECOM can only partially foster and promote the norms and indicators of hydrosolidarity in SADC. Whilst all the norms and indicators are present in the agreements and practices of the regimes, there are certain limitations to the extent to which the norms and indicators can be entrenched. There are three main reasons for this. Firstly, the regimes are confronted with various capacity constraints. Secondly, the regimes have a limited advisory and technical mandate, meaning that they cannot enforce their recommendations or actually implement anything in the domestic jurisdiction of member states without express permission. Thirdly, the regime structure itself is limited by its theoretical assumptions which emphasise the authority of states, the importance of state sovereignty and the importance of a Western-centric, positivist type of scientific knowledge as being the most authoritative statements of truth with which to guide policy. In order to fully achieve hydrosolidarity, a more complex set of actors needs to work in collaboration with these water regimes. These other actors include national governments, pre-existing bilateral arrangements in the basin, non-state actors and civil society. The theoretical contribution of this dissertation from a water perspective is a clarification of the norms and indicators of hydrosolidarity. From an IR perspective, it illustrates how important a multi-theoretical lens is when analysing complex problems, as it helps to elucidate the strengths and weaknesses of a variety of individual theoretical stances. The practical contribution of this dissertation is to provide a clearer understanding of the capacity of water regimes to deliver on the outlined norms and indicators of hydrosolidarity. / Dissertation (MA)--University of Pretoria, 2014. / gm2014 / Political Sciences / unrestricted

Magister Scientiae (Integrated Water Resource Management) / The questions posed in this study address the different processes that were involved in the decision-making and establishment of the water management organisations, the extent of public participation, as well as features of evident governance in implementing the policies. A critical analysis of the role of stakeholders and the various influences they may have in water management will also be examined. The methodology follows a historical study approach. A thorough document review will be done of the policies and related materials around BMCs, where events will be constructed from the findings. Interviews will be conducted for verification purposes, to verify the desktop findings and to assimilate any conflicts of opinion that might have not been documented. / South Africa

Drinking water supply insecurity is globally on the rise, and prevalent in most low and middle-income urban areas. Multiple responses have emerged to cope with the lack of a reliable and equitable supply of safe and sufficient drinking water in cities, which presents a wide range of social-ecological implications. Yet, many of the analyses to date are focused on predominantly technological, ecological, and economic perspectives, overlooking broader cultural and political dimensions. What are the elements and the interrelationship between them that sustain the lack of drinking water supply security at an urban scale? The empirical case study is located in Mexico City, the capital city of one of the most drinking water-insecure countries globally and among the world’s five largest metropolitan areas. Qualitative data is elicited from a literature review and semi-structured interviews with key experts and urban stakeholders. The results provide an integrated understanding of the proposed system structure that created and maintain the water supply problem in the long-term. Hindrances include knowledge lock-ins and critical dynamics that inhibit the political support to transition towards a drinking water security scenario. This study shows that drinking water supply crisis in the study area and other cities with similar conditions need to be understood as multi-dimensional and from a system perspective, by challenging underlying assumptions and embracing interconnectedness. Key feedback mechanisms are presented in causal loop diagrams, allowing the exploration of higher-order leverage points to reduce existing path-dependencies as one increasingly important research area, and potentially relevant for decision-makers.

Water represents a natural resource that is essential for humanity and the environment. Therefore, the framework of Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) seeks to combine social equity, ecological sustainability and economic efficiency for effective management of this critical resource. As the private sector is a major water user it represents an important stakeholder in sustainable water resources management. However, a quarter of countries reported a low level of private sector engagement in IWRM in the last SDG indicator 6.5.1 survey. Therefore, this thesis identifies obstacles to private sector engagement in IWRM and proposes interventions to improve the involvement of the private sector in water resources management. For this, it applies models for participatory approaches to the topic of private sector engagement. As water stewardship represents another approach for the private sector to get involved in sustainable water resources management, this concept is analysed as a possible alternative or complement to private sector engagement in IWRM. The first six expert interviews provided insight into general perspectives of the topic and then two case studies in Kenya (three interviews) and Viet Nam (five interviews) were used to understand private sector engagement in a country context. These case studies are further supported by secondary data from the SDG indicator 6.5.1 survey which analysed the degree of private sector engagement in IWRM across 171 countries. The research results suggest that topics of financing, innovation, the private sector’s convening power, its role as a major water user and its influence across the whole value chain represent opportunities of private sector engagement in IWRM, similar to the general benefits of participatory approaches. Furthermore, this research identifies several obstacles of which a lack of capacity, the complexity of the concept of IWRM, the complexity of government structures, data and information sharing, and a missing business case were considered the most important. For these topics, the thesis suggests several enabling factors that would improve private sector engagement. In the discussion, the relationship between IWRM and water stewardship is further explored as these two concepts can complement each other to provide new opportunities for private sector engagement. The research concludes that there is a need to redefine the concept of IWRM or to consider new approaches for sustainable water resources management to engage the private sector successfully.

Der intersektorale Wasserkonflikt zwischen urbaner und agrarischer Wassernutzung in Hyderabad und die Konkurrenz zwischen den Bedürfnissen der Stadt und den Ansprüchen der Landwirtschaft werden verschärft durch willkürliche Verteilungspraktiken, die den offiziellen Zuteilungsrichtlinien oft widersprechen. Übersetzt in die Sprache von Ostrom, gilt die vorliegende Untersuchung der Kernfrage, warum bestimmte praktizierte Regeln (rules-in-use) fortbestehen, obwohl formale Regeln (rules-in-form) im Bereich der Nutzungsrechte an Wasser vorhanden sind. Die Arbeit versucht dementsprechend zu erklären, wie bestehende Institutionen und Governancestrukturen die Interaktionen beteiligter Akteure und deren Verhalten beeinflussen und wie daraus eine durch Willkür gekennzeichnete Umverteilung erwächst. Knights Verteilungstheorie institutionellen Wandels und sein Ansatz über Machtressourcen vermögen zu erklären, wie menschliche Interaktionen in Zusammenhang mit solchen Konflikten über begrenzte Ressourcen zustande kommen. Die Ergebnisse der Arbeit zeigen ebenfalls, welche Wirkungen die Charakteristika verschiedener Gruppen von Wassernutzern und deren spezifische Abhängigkeit von Wasserressourcen auf ihre Fähigkeit zur politischen Einflussnahme ausüben. Solche Ausprägungen von Ressourcenabhängigkeiten bedingen Machtasymmetrien und erhöhen das Ausmaß willkürlicher Umverteilungen von Wasser. Die Untersuchung identifiziert eine Literaturlücke im Bereich der Politik der Wassergovernance, indem sie den Wählereinfluss als Machtressource im Land-Stadt-Konflikt um Wasserressourcen empirisch belegt. Die Arbeit zielt insgesamt darauf, das Erklärungspotential von Eigentumsrechtstheorien zu nutzen und anhand von Wasserkonflikten in Hyderabad ein Beispiel zur Anwendbarkeit aktueller Theorien institutionellen Wandels zu geben. / Hyderabad’s inter-sectoral water conflict and competition between the city’s urban needs and the agricultural sector have been fueled by persistent arbitrary water reallocations against the prescribed allocation guidelines. To translate the key question into Ostrom’s language; this study seeks to unravel the persistence of rules-in-use, despite the rules-in-form already in place within the realms of property rights. Ostrom’s Institutional Analysis and Development framework identifies exogenous variables and its influences on the role of institutions which shapes human interaction and decision making processes. It attempts to explain how the existing water-allocation mechanism has propagated the way rules and actors currently interact to influence such arbitrary water re-allocation. Knight’s distributional theory of institutional change and his concept of power resources provide good explanations of human interaction in the context of such conflicts over limited resources. The study results also reveal how the characteristics of water-user groups and its dependence on water resource have the ability to exert political influence over water allocation. Such attributes of resource dependence characterizes power asymmetry, thereby increasing the scale of arbitrary water reallocations. Henceforth, this study addresses the gap in ‘politics of water governance’ in existing literature by empirically deriving ‘political electorate’ as a power resource in rural-urban water contestation. Overall, this study seeks to employ the theoretical explanations of property rights and attempts to provide a case on the applicability of contemporary theories of institutional change by taking the case study of Hyderabad’s water contestation.

No description available.

BC Hydro’s Water Use Planning (WUP) process is one of the world’s most comprehensive hydroelectric dam operational reviews and has served as a model to revise hydropower operating plans with the participation of an inclusive range of stakeholders, rights holders, and the use of up-to-date scientific information, that meets social and environmental goals alongside economic targets. In 2000, BC Hydro initiated a WUP process in the Jordan River watershed. This watershed hosts a wide diversity of water users, including active resource industry stakeholders (mining, forestry, and hydropower), Indigenous rights holders, and rural community citizens; which is representative of watersheds in British Columbia with established WUPs. BC Hydro finalized the Jordan River WUP in 2003, which focuses on establishing critical freshwater flows for fish habitat and achieving specific recreational values of the local community. However, numerous other issues still remain that were beyond the scope of the WUP process, including water quality concerns that were continually brought up by citizens during the consultative process of the WUP. In addition to these concerns, biological monitoring following the implementation of the WUP suggests that contamination from an inactive copper mine has affected and altered sensitive water quality parameters for a healthy Pacific salmon habitat in Jordan River. Yet, there has not been an extensive water quality study conducted that examines the spatial or seasonal water quality extents of the mining contamination in Jordan River, specifically copper. Consequently, fourteen years after the creation of the WUP, local advocates are still struggling to have their concerns heard by the entity responsible for freshwater flow, BC Hydro, alongside federal and provincial government agencies. Advocates are calling for the creation of a watershed-based group as a mechanism for having greater influence in water planning and governance processes. This study explores the research question: if and how has the WUP process contributed to creating watershed governance capacity? This social science thesis project employs a mixed-methods approach using both quantitative and qualitative data. The study includes a document review of relevant water governance literature and focuses on examining the freshwater quality of the Jordan River. Water quality samples were collected over a five-week period from five sites on the Jordan River beginning in September and concluding in October of 2015 during the most sensitive periods of salmon spawning activity in the lower reaches of the Jordan River. Spatial and seasonal water quality trends were identified, and analysis concluded that copper is the primary contaminate affecting the productivity of a healthy salmon habitat in the Jordan River. Acid mine drainage (AMD) processes were identified throughout the water quality data and are strongly influenced by the proximity of existing mine waste piles sourced from an abandoned copper mine, and unnatural anthropogenic flows from the three BC Hydro dams present in the Jordan River system. The final stage of the research project focuses on assessing the adaptive capacity in the watershed to address the issues of concern outlined in the WUP. There is a current movement to create watershed organizations that are formally supported through new legislation in British Columbia, but questions remain about the capacities of these watershed communities to sustain such a formal institution and if these watershed communities are ready to successfully implement a local watershed governance model. The Gupta et al. (2010) six adaptive capacity dimensions provide a logical framework to explore if these capacities are present such that it could be expected that local watershed organizations would be effective as society adapts to more watershed-based governance approaches. Thirteen semi-structured interviews were conducted from October 2016 to February 2017. Interviews and observational data focused on the WUP process and prospective and current members of the Jordan Watershed Round Table (JWRT). The research evaluated whether these six adaptive capacity dimensions are present in watershed communities that have been subjected to water management processes, specifically the WUP program. Overall, the research concluded that the WUP has contributed to some adaptive capacity for watershed governance in the Jordan River, specifically on building the adaptive capacity dimensions: variety, learning capacity, room for autonomous change, leadership, and resources within the JWRT. / Graduate