| |
THE
VIEWPOINTS
Lyla Mehta's viewpoint:
Lyla Mehta is a sociologist and research fellow
in the Institute of Development Studies at the
University of Sussex, in the United Kingdom.
Problems of Publicness
and Access Rights: Perspectives from the Water
Domain
"Water
is not a pure public good"
Instead it is best seen as an impure public
good or common good, bearing in mind that technical
definitions of global public goods have tended
to ignore user's competing claims and interests
in the benefits and losses of commons.
In her paper, Problems of Publicness
and Access Rights: Perspectives from the Water
Domain" in Inge Kaul, Pedro Conceição,
Katell Le Goulven and Ronald U. Mendoza, eds.,
Providing
Global Public Goods: Managing Globalization
Oxford University Press 2003,Lyla Mehta
examines the situations that shape people's
access to water and hence its public availability.
It then explores the extent to which water has
local, national, regional, or global dimensions-
or even all of them in some measure. The discussion
then turns to current debates on the notion
of water as an economic good that would best
be managed by markets or, at least, market-based
mechanisms. This perspective is contrasted with
the view that access to water is a human right.
Finally, the chapter explores how the notion
of global public goods can be used to promote
people's access to water as a human right.
Some of the main conclusions
from the paper are:
| • |
Water provision
needs to be organized according to the scope
of the water system in question. At times
it will have to be managed locally, at other
times nationally, and other times regionally.
In addition, constant attention must be
paid to power asymmetries and inequalities
in water distribution and delivery at the
local, national, and regional levels. |
| • |
Water can
be made more public through institutional
mechanisms that protect it from overuse
and misuse and that devise equitable distribution
processes. These mechanisms need to be rooted
in local and regional dynamics, avoiding
top-down global blueprints- and with decisionmaking
based on negotiated outcomes. |
|
• |
Even though
water is rarely global in scope, there is
considerable scope for international action
and cooperation. International cooperation
has become increasingly important given
the global nature of water debates and of
social movements calling for equity in the
ownership and management of water resources. |
Excerpted from Lyla Mehta's
paper- Problems of Publicness and Access Rights:
Perspectives from the Water Domain" in Inge
Kaul, Pedro Conceição, Katell
Le Goulven and Ronald U. Mendoza, eds., Providing
Global Public Goods: Managing Globalization
Oxford University Press 2003. Click
here to download the complete paper.
Hakan
Tropp's viewpoint:
Hakan Tropp is a specialist
on water resources in United Nations Development
Programme, New York.
Advocates
of free market policies are likely to favour
private and transferable water rights, and pricing
that reflects scarcities. They suggest that
this will lead to efficient and equitable allocation
of resources and will provide the greatest incentives
to avoid wasteful practices. Private property
rights imply that the owner can exclude those
without rights or those not being able to afford
the good. A legitimate concern with privatisation
and increased commercialisation is that such
a policy may exclude poorer segments of society
from reasonable access to water.
Who owns the water?
Property regimes determine
who owns or has the right to control, regulate
and access water resources. Water rights are
complicated by the nature of water resources,
which move through the landscape and vary with
time (the hydrological cycle). Water and land-use
is intimately linked. Therefore, any reform
of water rights also has to address land rights
and vice versa. Water is also having a value
for various economic, social and environmental
uses. In many developing countries there is
increasing pressure to recognise and formalise
water rights. It raises complex questions about
the multiplicity of claims and water uses, and
as well as issues of efficient and equitable
allocation. In many developing countries, local
regulations, customary laws and traditional
rights often assign rights and responsibilities
that differ from state regulations. It is important
that formalisation of rights reflects traditional
informal water rights. An effective property
regime needs to address all these complexities.
Although the State will normally
legislate on issues of property rights, many
of the current problems of water governance
derive from too rigid, hierarchical and centralised
control by the State, and its inability to provide
sufficient water related services or enforce
regulations. It is often held that local communities,
together with water users' organisations,
can govern common resources in equitable and
efficient ways. Advocates of free market policies
are likely to favour private and transferable
water rights, and pricing that reflects scarcities.
They suggest that this will lead to efficient
and equitable allocation of resources and will
provide the greatest incentives to avoid wasteful
practices. Private property rights imply that
the owner can exclude those without rights or
those not being able to afford the good. A legitimate
concern with privatisation and increased commercialisation
is that such a policy may exclude poorer segments
of society from reasonable access to water.
Do water rights come with
obligations?
Any water use creates positive
or negative externalities (social, economic
and/or environmental). Much of the current water
use is unsustainable, which ultimately can lead
to the drying up of rivers and groundwater aquifers
and water becoming unusable due to deteriorating
quality. With rights should also come responsibilities
to maintain the resource as well as respecting
other water users. Water entitlements can include
obligations, such as respecting the rights of
down-stream water users, avoid over-abstraction,
pollution etc. The effective governance of water
would require that water rights and obligations
are clearly defined.
The capacity to protect formal
and informal rights against competing water
users is essential for the rights to be meaningful.
Due to the nature of water resources, illegal
abstractions are often easy and are common practice.
They can be difficult to resolve since the transaction
costs for controlling and excluding non-members
or owners, particularly in irrigated agriculture,
can be very high. Excessive illegal use threatens
to break down property rights and established
institutions, as well as depleting water resources.
A much less talked about issue
is: Who owns the wastewater? It should not come
as a surprise that anyone would like to posses
clean freshwater, however, in many countries
there are uncertainties about whose obligation
it is treat wastewater as well as minimising
water pollution.
Based on the final draft "Governing
Water Wisely", The World Water Development Report.
back to top |
