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Page 1: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Water, violence, conflict and cooperation

Dr. Ken Conca

[email protected]

Page 2: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Topics:

• The world’s water picture and global water challenges

• Water as a source of violent conflict (pathways and probabilities)

• Water cooperation initiatives

Page 3: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Water is…

…unsubstitutable in its most important uses;

…unevenly distributed;

…difficult to capture;

…movable, but often only at great social, economic, or ecological cost;

…highly variable over time in its availability.

Page 4: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

I. The world’s water challenges

• Addressing unmet human water needs

• Allocating water across competing sectoral needs: agricultural, industrial, municipal

• Managing and reversing the impact on critical freshwater ecosystems

Page 5: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Challenge: Unmet needs and water-related human insecurity

• An estimated 1.3 billion people currently lack reliable access to safe drinking water

• An estimated 2.6 billion lack adequate sanitation

• Struggle to keep pace with population growth in recent decades, much less make a dent in these figures

• Projection: Half the world’s people will live in conditions of “water insecurity” by 2035

Page 6: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Per-capita domestic water usePer-capita

consumption:Number of countries:

Aggregate population:

Largest countries:

< 25 lpcd 39 738 million Nigeria, Bangladesh, Ethiopia, DR

Congo

< 50 lpcd (WHO

standard)

62 2.2 billion India, Indonesia

< 100 lpcd 81 3.8 billion China, Pakistan

Source: Gleick, The World’s Water 2000-2001

Page 7: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Millennium Development

Goals“By 2015, cut in half the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water and sanitation.”

Page 8: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Millennium water goals: mixed progressRegion: Drinking water: Sanitation:

Arab States n.a. n.a.

Central/Eastern Europe

Achieved n.a.

East Asia/Pacific Lagging Lagging

Latin America &

Caribbean

On track Lagging

South Asia On track Lagging

Sub-Saharan Africa

Lagging Reversal

Source: Worldwatch Institute, State of the World 2005

Page 9: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Challenge: Addressing water demands of competing sectoral uses

• Growing inter-sectoral competition (agriculture vs. emerging industrial, municipal uses)

• Strong growth projections across all sectors--but ineffective mechanisms for allocating water across sectors

• Controversies over water pricing and private-sector participation

Page 10: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Challenge: Addressing environmental impacts and in-stream uses

• importance of freshwater ecosystem services

• cumulative toll of damming, diverting, draining, dumping, developing

• 1/3 of world’s fish species endangered (vast majority are freshwater fish)

• 800k dams on world’s rivers, 500k altered for navigation

Page 11: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

State of the world’s freshwater ecosystems

• Food production

• Water quality

• Water quantity

• Biodiversity

Condition: Capacity:

Good Mixed

Poor Decreasing

Fair Decreasing

Bad Decreasing

Source: World Resources Institute, Pilot Assessment of Global Ecosystems

Page 12: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

• “The wars of the next century will be over water.” (Ismail Serageldin, World Bank)

• “The next Middle East war will be over dwindling water supplies.” (Moammar Gaddafi)

• “Conditions are ripe for a century of water conflicts.” (The Economist )

II. Water as a source of violent conflict

Page 13: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

• What is the historical record?

• What likelihood of future conflict, given changing conditions?

• At what levels of social aggregation—localized, interstate, …?

• By what specific pathways?

Water and conflict: Some key questions

Page 14: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Gleick’s typology of historicalwater conflicts:

• Control of Water Resources: water supplies or access are at the root of tensions.

• Military Target: where water resources/systems are targets of military actions by nations or states.

• Military Tool: water resources/systems used as a weapon during a military action.

• Political Tool: water resources/systems themselves used for a political goal.

• Terrorism: water resources/systems are targets or tools of violence or coercion by non-state actors.

• Development Disputes: water resources/systems are a major source of contention/dispute in context of economic development.

Page 15: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Pacific Institute Water and Conflict Chronology

http://worldwater.org/conflict.htm

Page 16: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

• Interstate conflict in shared river basins

• Violence triggered along pre-existing social cleavages (ethnicity, identity group, social class, region)

• “Developmental” states in conflict with affected domestic communities

• Coercive environmental protection or water-related restrictions

Potential pathways to water-related violent conflict

Page 17: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Problem: Growing water stress in the world’s river basins

• 2.3 billion people live in river basins under “water stress” (<1700 cu. meters/yr per capita)

• 1.7 billion people live in river basins under “high water stress” (<1000 cu. meters/yr per capita)

Source: World Resources Institute, World Resources 2000-2001

Page 18: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

• 263 internationally shared river basins

• fewer than 20% have a cooperative international agreement in effect

• only a handful have accords involving all basin states

• 1997 U.N. Convention on Shared Watercourses--not in force

Problem: Thinly institutionalized cooperation on shared basins

Page 19: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Oregon State University “Basins at Risk” project (Wolf et al)

•50-year database of scaled cooperative and conflictual events

•Tested wide array of social, economic, political variables for causal link to conflictual/cooperative events

•Used results to identify “basins at risk”

Page 20: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Findings:

• Cooperative events outnumber conflictual by more than 2 to 1

• Few extreme events

• Major issues: water quantity and water infrastructure

• Variables that don’t explain much: income level, regime type, water stress (!)

Page 21: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Findings (cont’d):

Key is rate of change—when rate of change within basin exceeds capacity of institutions to adapt—specifically:

• “internationalized” basins

• unilateral development in the absence of international cooperative agreement

Page 22: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Findings (cont’d)• From this, extrapolate 17 “basins at risk”

Ganges-Brahmaputra

La Plata Orange

Han Lempa Salween

Incomati Limpopo Senegal

Kunene Mekong Tumen

Kura-Araks Ob (Ertis) Zambezi

Lake Chad Okavango

Source: Wolf et al, “International Waters: Identifying Basins at Risk,” Water Policy 5 Number 1 (2003) 29-60

Page 23: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Pathways to violent conflict:

• Interstate conflict in shared river basins

• Violence triggered along pre-existing social cleavages (ethnicity, identity group, social class, region)

• “Developmental” states in conflict with affected domestic communities

• Coercive environmental protection or water-related restrictions

Page 24: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

The Homer-Dixon thesis:

• Scarcity-induced violent conflict as a result of environmental change

• Tendency of conflict to play out along pre-existing social cleavages

• “Yes, but…”: Subsequent statistical studies show weak association, low-grade violence, importance of intervening variables

Page 25: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Pathways to violent conflict:

• Interstate conflict in shared river basins

• Violence triggered along pre-existing social cleavages (ethnicity, identity group, social class, region)

• “Developmental” states in conflict with affected domestic communities

• Coercive environmental protection or water-related restrictions

Page 26: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Critical ecosystem

Anchor of local livelihoods and culture

Scarce commodity with market value

Page 27: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

“A river plays a very big role in our culture. It has a lot to do. If somebody passes away or maybe was killed by the lightning, usually he would be buried next to the river. It is a place where our traditional doctors go to get qualified. Some people say they talk with their ancestors right in the river. If a girl is about to start her first period, a traditional way to guide her is to take her to the river. Apart from that, if someone in the family dreams about a river, it will mean that someone in the family is pregnant; and if I am a mother, I should know that something is wrong with one of my daughters.”

--Mathato Khit’sane, Highlands Church Action Group, Lesotho

Page 28: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Nehru: “Dams are the temples of modern India.”

Stalin: “Water which is allowed to enter the sea is wasted.”

World Commission on Dams estimates that 40-80 million people have been displaced to make way for large dams and water projects

Page 29: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Trends in state-society water development conflicts

• Transnationalization of opposition

• Increasing success of dam opponents (in context of greater private-sector role)

• World Commission on Dams as a forum for dialogue, conflict resolution

• Endurance of site-specific violence when movements choose confrontation and states choose repression

Page 30: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Pathways to violent conflict:

• Interstate conflict in shared river basins

• Violence triggered along pre-existing social cleavages (ethnicity, identity group, social class, region)

• “Developmental” states in conflict with affected domestic communities

• Coercive environmental protection or water-related restrictions

Page 31: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

“The squatters live…next to a polluted river and the local

authority fear that it could be a source of cholera.” (BBC 2-13-01)

Page 32: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

• International river-basin cooperation

• ‘Stakeholder’ dialogues around infrastructure and privatization controversies

• Domestic water policy reforms

III. Water Cooperation Initiatives

Page 33: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Principles for shared river basins (1997 U.N. Convention)

• All basin states participate

• “Equitable and reasonable use”

• Obligation to avoid “significant harm”

• Regular exchange of information

• Prior notification

• Peaceful dispute resolution

Page 34: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Water cooperation initiatives

• International river-basin cooperation

• ‘Stakeholder’ dialogues around infrastructure and privatization controversies

• Domestic water policy reforms

Page 35: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

World Commission on Dams

UN Environment ProgrammeDams and Development Project

Page 36: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Water cooperation initiatives

• International river-basin cooperation

• ‘Stakeholder’ dialogues around infrastructure and privatization controversies

• Domestic water policy reforms

Page 37: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

• Brazil: basin-level committees, mixed-membership bodies geared toward conflict resolution

• South Africa: human and environmental “reserves”, pricing reforms/minimum free allocation

Examples of innovative domestic water-policy reforms

Page 38: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Global 2000: Major Conclusions

“Regional water shortages will become more severe. In the 1970-2000 period population growth alone will cause requirements for water to double in nearly half the world. Still greater increases would be needed to improve standards of living. In many [less-developed countries], water supplies will become increasingly erratic by 2000 as a result of extensive deforestation. Development of new water supplies will become more costly virtually everywhere.”

Page 39: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Projected Global Water Withdrawals in Year 2000 (cu. km),

by year of forecast

0

2000

4000

6000

8000

10000

1960 1970 1980 1990 2000

Source: Adapted from Gleick, The World’s Water 2000-2001

Page 40: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Scenarios for global water use in 2025

scenario:

• Raskin “reference”• Seckler “BAU”

• Gleick “vision”• WWC “vision”

• Raskin “reform” • Seckler “efficiency”

projected withdrawal (cu. km/yr):

50444569

42704200

40543625

Page 41: Water, violence, conflict and cooperation Dr. Ken Conca kconca@gvpt.umd.edu.

Critical variables shaping water futures:

-Population growth

-Economic growth

-Technological innovation

** Water finance trends & pricing policies

** Management of social controversies

** International river diplomacy