Water management has become a major issue for public policies at any latitude. How and why this happened could not be assessed efficiently without developing a longitudinal and comparative analysis, such as the one in this book. Institutional arrangements for the provision and the use of water are peculiarly persistent as well as remarkably resilient: This makes them an ideal subject of an historical account. Not that history is worth writing about only when it treats immutable phenomena. On the contrary; its main purpose is to record changes and possibly explain them. But long-lasting continuity urges the scholar to venture into the remote past, since only there are to be discovered the initial causes and the deeper meanings of the institutions under scrutiny. Also, continuity makes the strength of path-dependency all the more evident and consequently underlines the weight of history.
Frontiers in Urban Water Management presents the state-of-the art in urban water management at the beginning of the 21st century. The book marks the end of the fifth phase of UNESCO's International Hydrological Programme in this field by bringing together major scientific and professional players to address critical and topical issues in water management. This team of leading world experts investigate themes such as the challenges of urban water management, infrastructure integration issues, and emerging paradigms in water supply and sanitation. Key issues are investigated from the hydrological, technical and managerial points of view, incorporating both social and economic realities. Specific reference is also made to solutions for developing countries. With a view to the future, conclusions from past experiences are highlighted, new pathways are explored and future developments are suggested. Contents The challenge of urban water management Urban water as a part of integrated catchment management Interactions with the environment Infrastructure integration issues Emerging paradigms in water supply and sanitation Problems of developing countries Economic and financial aspects Social, institutional and regulatory issues Outlook for the 21st Century
Things which we regard as the everyday objects of consumption (and hence re-purchase), and essential to any decent, civilised lifestyle, have not always been so: in former times, everyday objects would have passed from one generation to another, without anyone dreaming of acquiring new ones. How, therefore, have people in the modern world become 'prisoners of objects', as Rousseau put it? The celebrated French cultural historian Daniel Roche answers this fundamental question using insights from economics, politics, demography and geography, as well as his own extensive historical knowledge. Professor Roche places familiar objects and commodities - houses, clothes, water - in their wider historical and anthropological contexts, and explores the origins of some of the daily furnishings of modern life. A History of Everyday Things is a pioneering essay that sheds light on the origins of the consumer society and its social and political repercussions, and thereby the birth of the modern world.
Setting the scene with a thorough introduction to water resource issues, Water Privatisation critically examines the new role played by Trans-National Corporations in managing and distributing water worldwide.Written from an organisational and institutional perspective, the authors propose new structures of water management at local, national and i
This book looks at the major challenges of the future. Packed with the latest information and scientific understanding, it traverses a rich tapestry of crucial issues, threats and choices confronting humanity and proposes a new start basd on four broad contracts: social, natural, cultural and ethical. To problems with global dimensions correspond global solutions. The culture of violence must become a culture of peace. The choice is stark: either a 21st century with a human face or the grimacing mask of a 'Brave New World'.
This book describes the impact of modernization on the organization and sustainability of Urban Water Systems in Europe (UWSEs). Bolognesi explains that the modernization of UWSEs was a regulatory shock that began in the 1990s and was put into action with the EU Water Framework Directive in the year 2000. This process sought to reorganize water governance in order to achieve certain sustainability goals, but it fell short of expectations. Modernization and Urban Water Governance provides an update on the organization and sustainability of UWSEs, while drawing from a comparative analysis of German, French, and English water models and an institutionalist explanation of the current situation. With a focus on transaction costs, property rights allocation and institutional environments, this book argues that the modernization of UWSEs tends to depoliticize these systems and make them more resilient but also limits their potential for sustainable management. This book will be relevant to those wishing to understand the real impacts of water reform in Europe according to national contingencies.
Surrounded by water and located at the heart of a fertile plain, the Island of Montreal has been a crossroads for Indigenous peoples, European settlers, and today's citizens, and an inland port city for the movement of people and goods into and out of North America. Commemorating the city's 375th anniversary, Montreal: The History of a North American City is the definitive, two-volume account of this fascinating metropolis and its storied hinterland. This comprehensive collection of essays, filled with hundreds of illustrations, photographs, and maps, draws on human geography and environmental history to show that while certain distinctive features remain unchanged – Mount Royal, the Lachine Rapids of the Saint Lawrence River – human intervention and urban evolution mean that over time Montrealers have had drastically different experiences and historical understandings. Significant issues such as religion, government, social conditions, the economy, labour, transportation, culture and entertainment, and scientific and technological innovation are treated thematically in innovative and diverse chapters to illuminate how people's lives changed along with the transformation of Montreal. This history of a city in motion presents an entire picture of the changes that have marked the region as it spread from the old city of Ville-Marie into parishes, autonomous towns, boroughs, and suburbs on and off the island. The first volume encompasses the city up to 1930, vividly depicting the lives of First Nations prior to the arrival of Europeans, colonization by the French, and the beginning of British Rule. The crucial roles of waterways, portaging, paths, and trails as the primary means of travelling and trade are first examined before delving into the construction of canals, railways, and the first major roads. Nineteenth-century industrialization created a period of near-total change in Montreal as it became Canada's leading city and witnessed staggering population growth from less than 20,000 people in 1800 to over one million by 1930. The second volume treats the history of Montreal since 1930, the year that the Jacques Cartier Bridge was opened and allowed for the outward expansion of a region, which before had been confined to the island. From the Great Depression and Montreal's role as a munitions manufacturing centre during the Second World War to major cultural events like Expo 67, the twentieth century saw Montreal grow into one of the continent's largest cities, requiring stringent management of infrastructure, public utilities, and transportation. This volume also extensively studies the kinds of political debate with which the region and country still grapple regarding language, nationalism, federalism, and self-determination. Contributors include Philippe Apparicio (INRS), Guy Bellavance (INRS), Laurence Bherer (University of Montreal), Stéphane Castonguay (UQTR), the late Jean-Pierre Collin (INRS), Magda Fahrni (UQAM), the late Jean-Marie Fecteau (UQAM), Dany Fougères (UQAM), Robert Gagnon (UQAM), Danielle Gauvreau (Concordia), Annick Germain (INRS), Janice Harvey (Dawson College), Annie-Claude Labrecque (independent scholar), Yvan Lamonde (McGill), Daniel Latouche (INRS), Roderick MacLeod (independent scholar), Paula Negron-Poblete (University of Montreal), Normand Perron (INRS), Martin Petitclerc (UQAM), Christian Poirier (INRS), Claire Poitras (INRS), Mario Polèse (INRS), Myriam Richard (unaffiliated), Damaris Rose (INRS), Anne-Marie Séguin (INRS), Gilles Sénécal (INRS), Valérie Shaffer (independent scholar), Richard Shearmur (McGill), Sylvie Taschereau (UQTR), Michel Trépanier (INRS), Laurent Turcot (UQTR), Nathalie Vachon (INRS), and Roland Viau (University of Montreal).
A groundbreaking work of scholarship that sheds critical new light on the urban renewal of Paris under Napoleon III In the mid-nineteenth century, Napoleon III and his prefect, Georges-Eugène Haussmann, adapted Paris to the requirements of industrial capitalism, endowing the old city with elegant boulevards, an enhanced water supply, modern sewers, and public greenery. Esther da Costa Meyer provides a major reassessment of this ambitious project, which resulted in widespread destruction in the historic center, displacing thousands of poor residents and polarizing the urban fabric. Drawing on newspapers, memoirs, and other archival materials, da Costa Meyer explores how people from different social strata—both women and men—experienced the urban reforms implemented by the Second Empire. As hundreds of tenements were destroyed to make way for upscale apartment buildings, thousands of impoverished residents were forced to the periphery, which lacked the services enjoyed by wealthier parts of the city. Challenging the idea of Paris as the capital of modernity, da Costa Meyer shows how the city was the hub of a sprawling colonial empire extending from the Caribbean to Asia, and exposes the underlying violence that enriched it at the expense of overseas territories. This marvelously illustrated book brings to light the contributions of those who actually built and maintained the impressive infrastructure of Paris, and reveals the consequences of colonial practices for the city's cultural, economic, and political life.
Rembrandt's life and art had an almost mythic resonance in nineteenth-century France with artists, critics, and collectors alike using his artistic persona both as a benchmark and as justification for their own goals. This first in-depth study of the traditional critical reception of Rembrandt reveals the preoccupation with his perceived "authenticity," "naturalism," and "naiveté," demonstrating how the artist became an ancestral figure, a talisman with whom others aligned themselves to increase the value of their own work. And in a concluding chapter, the author looks at the playRembrandt, staged in Paris in 1898, whose production and advertising are a testament to the enduring power of the artist's myth.
