General Introduction

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Only 3% of the worlds water is fresh water. This 3% must meet the needs of 7 billion people. The
demands are varied - from hydropower and fishing to irrigation and drinking water. And all these uses are
facing new threats. Climate change, accelerated by human activity and greenhouse gas emissions,
seriously affect water resources. These environmental challenges are compounded further by a number of
societal concerns. For example, in developing countries, the lack of access to water has become critical
over the last 30 years.
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The main focus of this course will be to address water management issues and, within the context of
climate change, to gain a better understanding of what the future of water will look like. These are the key
elements to be discussed throughout this course.
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>> Throughout its journey, from the source to the tap, the water industry sector is affected by so many
different issues. As you know, we have already spoken about environmental changes and the issue of
pollution caused by humans. We will also discuss the conflicts that exist between rival sectors of
activity such as hydroelectricity, power generation, irrigation for agriculture, households and
industry. These activities are all dependant on one single resource, and whilst water is a renewable
resource, it is, nevertheless, limited. >> The aim of this course will be to understand how these conflicts
are managed. We will analyse from a cross-sectoral perspective the different economic sectors that rely on
water: agriculture, towns and cities, urbanisation, energy. We will also analyse the notion of
interdependence around major watersheds. The cross-border element of these large watersheds, raise
crucial questions about the relationships between States.
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>> This MOOC is designed for anyone who is interested in the water sector. You do not need to have any
prior training to follow this course. The course aims to be easily reapplied within different contexts and to
different levels of analysis. You are invited to simply follow your curiosity and your desire to
better understand the issues that are affecting the water sector.
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>> We hope that this introduction has captured your interest and and encouraged you to follow the
modules. We look forward to welcoming you and accompanying you throughout the duration of the
course.

1.1 Introduction to Module 1

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Hello. The objective of this first module, is to focus on the resource of water, how it is defined, how it is
used and the regulations which guide its use. We start by defining the major challenges facing water in the
twenty-first century. Next, we will define what is a resource and more specifically define what is the
resource of water, its uses and its users.
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Then we will address the question of the tragedy of the commons. Why do these common resources tend
to be overexploited This will enable us to focus on the problem of managing common resources through
the work of the Nobel Prize Winner, Elinor Ostrom. Her work on the management of common
goods shows how we could overcome this tragedy. Through a practical example, here the case study of
Latin America, we can illustrate how the management of common goods can be a way to resolve the
tragedy and achieve sustainable management of the resource.

1.2 The Main Challenges in Water Governance I: Uses, Rules and Territories
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Among the major issues that concern decision-makers, managers and politicians in charge of the
regulation of water resources, there are three that are particularly associated with its management: the
question of use the question of rules and the question of territory. Regarding use, over the last 200 years,
there has been an increase and a diversification in how water is used. Take the example of a river or
lake. Two hundred or two hundred and fifty years ago, in the 18th Century, there was very little use and
very few users. It was used for fishing. It was used for navigation but ultimately, used for little else. And
then gradually it started to be used for power using mills to churn the water. The creation of the water jet
behind me is a good example. The water jet of Geneva is actually created by the pressure released by the
pressurized water system which has fed the city. This diversification of uses takes one more significant
step with the birth of hydroelectrical power which opens up the development of uses, further afield than
the resource as found in individual households With the diversification of uses we also witness the
development of the regulatory field and a diversification of the rules.
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Modern political societies have developed a series of regulations that governs all the way that water is
used. These regulations are more and more diverse, are at different levels and today, a water user is faced
with numerous regulations not only at the municipal level, the cantonal level, inter-cantonal or federal
level but there are also regulations made for European states, at a European level, And even international
guidelines. All these rules have accumulated and have eventually produced a regulatory body which is
increasingly rich.
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The fact that this body is becoming even richer, is explained by the fact that rules tend to accumulate and
to stack up over time. Laws are very rarely cancelled or removed but rather, we add more. And in fact, this
ongoing extension of the regulation presents three major difficulties to users. The first difficulty, is that for
an individual user,
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like you and me, or even for a professional user, it is very difficult to fully master the whole body of
existing regulation. The second difficulty is that these rules will offer all sorts of ways for users to defend
their rights and to oppose, to challenge a rival and to defend themselves in court. Ultimately, this can
generate conflict around the resource of water. The third problem, the third difficulty, is that these rules
sometimes contradict themselves. And this is indeed an important issue because in the future, we must be
able to make these regulations coherent if we want to achieve a fair management of resource and in turn,
the consistent behavior of all the different users.
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The third challenge concerns territory and the territoriality of water resources. Until recently, people
tended to consider that all resources located on their (communal, regional or national)
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territory belonged to them. The doctrine Harmon, from the US jurist Judson Harmon, stated that all
resources located on territory in a sovereign state are owned by and are the sole responsibility of that
state.
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However, over time and with the diversification of use, such as we discussed earlier, it became
increasingly difficult to manage
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resources and water resources in the straightjacket that was created by these territories, both regional and
national. Why? Well because the resource moves

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At the end of the day, rivers have no borders, regardless of whether these borders are communal or
regional. But also because the uses of some has an impact on the capacity of use of others. If an upstream
state pollutes, the state downstream will have difficulties using the resource efficiently and fairly.
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And in fact, the key question today concerning the management of our resources, is how to go beyond the
national perimeters, the national or even regional legal frameworks, which are defining the management
of our water resources.
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That is why several countries, from the late nineteenth century/ start of the twentieth century, developed a
series of new authorities, new water management bodies, across different watersheds or groundwater
aquifers to develop territories, policy spaces of management that go beyond, and transcend the political
and historical frontiers. These new territories, somehow challenged the legitimacy of the older, general
political spaces. But territorially speaking, governance of the resource was also changing, and this time
the change was on the scale of globalization.
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As seen for the last twenty years, be it at the World Water Forum or during International Water Week, a
series of major events are were taking place on an international stage making water a common challenge
for the world. Organizations such as the International Office for Water, the World Water Forum, the United
Nations, the United Nations Program for Water.
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All these bodies were developed to make water a global issue and finally, to challenge the regional and
local management that had dominated until this point.
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The objective is to somehow challenge governance that is purely local, regional or national resource or to
make water a common good, indeed, even a global good. So, what do we see? Finally we see that we
move away from resource that is initially managed very locally, very regionally, and towards a resource
that is managed increasingly cross-borders and on a global scale. And finally, there is a dispute, a
competition between these different territorialities, between these different methods of territorial
management of the resource. This competition does not die down and it does not stop over time. National
claims on water resources are becoming
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stronger. In parallel, watershed style management
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ideas and principles increasingly spread around. Globalization tends to spread, and as a result these types
of tensions between different visions of territoriality merely become exacerbated.
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In summary, at the end of this sequence, we have seen that the uses of water are increasingly diverse, the
rules are increasingly numerous and widespread, and the territories and territoriality, as well as the
resource management methods are increasingly competitive. And finally, to come back to the question of
water management.
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It is increasingly complex for users to master these challenges, these rules and likewise to know and to
agree on
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the correct style of management. Next, we will see that there are three other issues linked to resource
management: the question of finance, methods of management between public and private and multisectorality.

1.3 The Main Challenges of Water Governance II: Multisectoriality, Funding and
Management Modes
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Putting aside the issues of governance, we find ourselves at a turning point for water resource
management challenges. Why? Firstly, the challenges have become increasingly intersectoral. They must
take into account the increasingly integrated specificities of the sector. Secondly, ongoing funding
problems are present on every continent, no matter the method of management. And thirdly, the fact that
management methods public, private, community, are all facing challenges and an increasing number of
crises. Let start with the first challenge: multisectorality. Throughout history, particularly in modern
political societies, mens relationship to the resource was structured around sectoral relationships. The
resource was managed, from an agricultural perspective, by irrigation, energy policies were established.
The resource was managed from the perspective of the production of hydropower. The protection of
ecosystems is now part and parcel of environmental policies. Irrigation and agriculture,
hydropower, energy, ecosystem protection and environmental policies, are multiplied and there are a
whole range of sectors that use water resources. But over time, these sectors tend to see their
knowledge, their way of doing things, their practices solidify, crystallize. Their reference systems become
fixed in such a way that the concerns of the agricultural sector or of the power sector are totally
different. These sectors are fragmented, and this is what is called silo management, increasingly
compartmentalized In the end we lose the vision of a common integrated resource. But for some years
now, about thirty years, the big question is how to find unity in how the resource is managed. We have
already talked about territorial issues. It is the same for intersectoral issues. How to find a transversal
vision of water resources that transcends the different sectors? And despite the development of important
concepts, that we will soon have the opportunity to consider, integrated water management or the Nexus,
water, energy, food, political societies have not yet found the ideal way to manage the question of
intersectorality. The problem of intersectorality also raises the more fundamental question of
funding. Why? The development of policies including environmental, put in place increasing standards of
quality, standards of good management of water resources. Water quality needs to be good when returning
to the natural environment to enable ecosystems to survive and reproduce. All these questions mean that
instead of increasing standards, we increase the number of standards on water resources. An example: in
the United States, there were no less than 60 standards for drinking water or water quality. In France, it is
almost as much, between 60 and 80. Now all these standards, these 60, 100 standards depending on the
country, must be paid for by users This is what the doctrine of saving water wants - for each user to pay
the full cost of its use. From the treatment of water upstream to the de-pollution of the waste water
downstream. In reality, this principle of full cost recovery means an increase in prices whenever the
water costs and treatment costs rise. By studying the case of Santiago de Chile, I had the opportunity to
show that in 20 years, the price has more than doubled as a result of improvements in environmental
standards. In a developing country such as Chile and the region of Santiago, the impact of rising
prices was seen directly in the number of people who couldnt pay, in the number of water supply cuts,
finally leading to the social inaccessibility of water. This map shows the gradual spread of the number of
unpaid water bills and the increase in the environmental standards and their impact on water prices. All
these issues raise important questions. Could the users afford to pay their water service? This question is
valid, as seen with Santiago du Chili, but it is also a valid question in the European Union with
its framework directive on water and and its various areas of implementation. We can wonder more and
more about our ability to pay for water and its associated services in terms of environmental
protection. This question of willingness to pay and even the ability to pay the correct price reminds us that
historically, water services have been subsidized and supported by public budgets. But in a context of
fairly widespread crisis of public finances, even this perspective of public support of water budgets is

questionable. So, throughout the world and no matter the management method the funding crisis threatens
all public drinking water services. Thirdly, the private management methods developed throughout the
nineteenth, late nineteenth and especially throughout the twentieth century especially in large cities,
involving concession schemes where the collective public gives the management of its water service to a
private company, services are completely privatized. Eventually, all these management methods, were
able to hybridize, to mix, so there are community public management methods, private community
methods, public private methods but all with the commonality that in times of crisis, they question their
future. It has also a lot to do with issues of funding we just talked about. The public model can have
trouble accessing capital for investments, for the renewal of its networks, for investment in drinking water
treatment infrastructures, as we just discussed. The private model has easier access to capital but
nevertheless comes up against acute problems in terms of access to safe water for all, or the overall
profitability of the system. The private model can also pose supervision problems as the public power to
oversee the functioning of private companies can make these companies too expensive for a local
community. The community model, meanwhile, faces critical challenges of professionalization and the
daily financing of drinking water services due to their ability to pay, which we spoke about earlier. These
three types of services, these three types of models, public, private, community, are all at a crossroads and
we have to rethink these management modes in the light of major contemporary issues raised by
intersectoriality and the imposition of additional costs for the users which can sometimes make a big
difference to the bill.

1.4 The Concept of Resource (Use, Scarcity and Rivalry)

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In this section, we
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will focus on the system of resources and on the concept of a resource. We will try to gain a better
understanding of how this system works and what are the implications for the management of water.
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On the photo of a landscape that you see here,
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you will be able to identify different types of resources. First, you can see the ground, but you can also see
that tree. Other types of resources are also hiding here. For example, you could mention the air. You could
equally speak of the landscape as a resource.
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So we will first of all ask how this notion is defined.
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Above all, a resource is a production system. A system which, as we shall see, helps produce different
types of goods and services to be appropriated by a range of different end users. Next, the resource is tied
to an anthropocentric point of view.
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The tree that you see in the picture becomes a resource from the time as soon as it participated in a system
of production which will ultimately deliver goods and services appropriated by humans.
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Therefore, the tree in question represents a system which will evolve according to socio-economic and
socio-cultural conditions. The resource is not always treated in the same way
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and this also depends on technological developments. The water sector demonstrates this well with the
emergence of urban wastewater, with potabilisation systems and sanitation.
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As described by De Gregori, the resource is not, it becomes. It depends on how it is considered by
humans. The resource is therefore the result of practices and uses that are constantly changing.
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If we adopt a anthropocentric perspective, we can then consider water as a system which allows the
production of these well known goods and services.
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The resource, a renewable resource, is interesting to us because of the way that it is managed, made up
from a stock resource where the minimum quantity and quality are necessary for reproduction as the
system naturally replenishes itself. It is therefore the background of the resources system that must be
maintained to ensure the renewal and durability of the system as a whole, and likewise for the production
of goods and services.
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Next, the resource consists of fruits, be it all the units produced at a certain pace, a pace set by the
resource system. These fruits are not necessarily consumed, these fruits may exist but it is not a given that
we will pick them, just as, for example, apples on an apple tree.
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However, if they are consumed, then we can speak of goods and services that
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individuals will use.
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Lets go back to our tree, and consider that this tree is a resource system made up of a supply which
ultimately enables the production of goods and services for different types of users.
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These different photos show different configurations, different ways of managing the system. Can you see
the differences, the distinctions between these different stages, these different ways in which the the
resource supply can be considered? We can make several observations. Firstly, the tree can be considered
as a resource by the simple fact that it beautifies the landscape. It can also be a resource that produces
fruit, fruit that enables different types of goods and services such as the apple into which I am about to
bite, the apple juice that Id like to drink or even the ice-cream that I will eat.
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However, the tree can also be used differently. It can be cut, it can be used to make a table such as the one
on which you are viewing this Therefore, these photos clearly show that the way that the resource is
exploited can have very different effects on the management of the supply of resources.
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For example, what is the difference between apple juice and the construction of planks? In one case, it is
only the fruit that is touched and in doing so we guarantee a seasonal renewal of the resource and fruit
production. In the other case, the resource is actually consumed but this time it is more or less
irreversible. The supply of resources are managed very, very differently.
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This example illustrates the constant evolution of the system. These are the practices, as we have seen, the
socio-economic practices that will make the resource and that will also change the perception that we have
of a system of resources.
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The apple harvesting practices have created various uses,
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from simple fruit picking through to the construction of furniture. In this context, water is also a resource
system. It is a system composed of a supply which allows a quantitative and qualitative renewal of the
system and produces fruits and therefore goods and services that can be used by humans.
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These goods and services are many. Think about life in a general sense but you can also think about
production uses of the resource including energy, hydropower, nuclear power, or even irrigation or
industry. One can also think of other services provided by this system such as landscapes which have been
sculpted by the resource, for example.
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Given the multitude of goods and services produced by the resource, and with a view on sustainability, it
is therefore about ensuring the renewal capacity of the resource supply.
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How the system is used can carry the balance such as when the consumption of fruits does not affect the
renewal capacity. Or it can lead to over-exploitation as in the case where fruit consumption exceeds the
renewal capacity of the system, or the sub-system operation. It should be noted here that underexploitation can likewise pose a problem. For example, there is the case of a stock of places to live.
Apartments left unoccupied for many years.
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In other words, if there is a multitude of goods and services, there will be many users, users who are rivals
when in the resource system. As said by Sproule Jones: a rivalry is born from the scarcity of a resource.
So here it is important to properly distinguish between different types of scarcity. There is not only one
type. Firstly there is objective scarcity versus scarcity that is socially perceived or politically constructed.
This is the case of an oil shortage in an oil producing country. There is also absolute scarcity versus
relative scarcity where it is worthwhile seeking out a resource very deep underground. Take the example
of petrol, where the cost of extraction will cost more than the sale price of the resource.
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There is widespread scarcity versus localized scarcity, for example, in a country like Switzerland the
water tower of Europe. There are situations where procurement is difficult, occasional difficulties but
difficulties nonetheless.
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There is long-term scarcity, structural scarcity, versus short-term scarcity and finally regular scarcity,
recurrent, versus the unpredictable scarcity which is typically seen in situations of flooding or of severe
drought.
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Finally, regarding rivalries, several remarks need to be made. First of all, we distinguish between rivalry
of use and conflict of use. A rivalry exists the moment that several users depend on one resource
system This rivalry may be more or less exacerbated but does not necessarily lead to conflict. Next, a
rivalry can be mitigated, and can even disappear or if a a supply of resources use disappears, use rival
disappears, or if the resource stock is considerably increased, as a result of a technological influence.
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Finally, use rivalries are not necessarily negative. They allow competition between different uses but they
also enable technological innovations. This can be a product of this competition,
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where practices are changed to mitigate a rivalry, for example the movement from sprinkler irrigation to
drip irrigation.