The Politics of Water Institutional Reform in Neo-Patrimonial States
The Politics of Water Institutional Reform in Neo-Patrimonial States

Author: Jenniver Sehring

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2009-01-30

Total Pages: 227

ISBN-13: 3531913778

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“There is more than enough water in the world for domestic purposes, for agriculture and for industry. (...) In short, scarcity is manufactured through political processes and institutions (...). ” (United Nations Human Development Report 2006: 3) Water scarcity, water crisis, water wars – since the beginning of the 1990s these terms have appeared again and again in scientific debates, political strategies, and media reports. Water is perceived as a scarce resource that needs efficient management in order to satisfy all needs and to prevent violent conflicts over its distribution. Considerable research has been devoted to this topic. In this research, water is commonly referred to as a common pool resource: a n- excludable public good with rivalry in terms of consumption. Hence, research has long focused on collective action problems in managing this common pool resource (e. g. Ostrom 1990, 1992). In recent years, anthropological and sociological scholars in particular have criticized that in these studies the complexity of water, its embeddedness in a wider cultural and social c- text, and the role of power have been neglected. Water is different from other natural - sources in some important aspects: its mobility, its variability, and its multiplicity (Mehta 2006: 2f; Linton 2006: [10]). Mobility makes ownership claims difficult: Water moves, transcending state borders, not fixed like other resources. Variability refers to the fact that its availability varies temporarily, depending on weather conditions.

The Irrigation Sector
The Irrigation Sector

Author:

Publisher: World Bank Publications

Published: 1999

Total Pages: 148

ISBN-13: 9780821344644

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India's irrigated agriculture sector has been basic to India's economic development and poverty alleviation. One of India's major achievements is its rapid expansion of irrigation and drainage infrastructure. However, the major emphasis on development has been achieved at a cost. The importance put on new construction has diverted attention away from the need to ensure the quality, productivity, and sustainability of the services. Further, a governmental subsidy based approach has been used and this has resulted in irrigation and drainage services which, while enabling significantly higher productivity than from non-irrigated lands, are well below their potential. 'The Irrigation Sector' discusses directions for future growth, the framework for reform, and the reform agenda.

Making a Large Irrigation Scheme Work
Making a Large Irrigation Scheme Work

Author: Djibril Aw

Publisher: World Bank Publications

Published: 2005

Total Pages: 180

ISBN-13: 9780821359426

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"Making a Large Irrigation Scheme Work provides a history of irrigation management in Mali from colonial times to post-independence. It looks at how irrigation management reforms came about at Mali?s Office du Niger and how relevant this reform process is for irrigation schemes in other countries. Mali?s irrigation scheme was an outcome of colonial settlement with the corresponding lack of rights for cultivators to own land, process paddy, and market rice. Post-independence, a coalition of government and irrigation agency staff contributed to governmental unwillingness to reform the scheme?s management. Government interest lay in satisfying the growing demand for rice from its burgeoning urban constituency and a fear of riots in response to rice shortages and high prices. It?s interest also lay with maintaining the support of the agency?s staff. The authors analyze how field teams, funded by bilateral donors, shaped technical and institutional change to fully reform management and how grain market reforms provided farmers stronger incentives and raised yields. The combination of changes inside and outside the scheme gradually shifted the balance of power and led to a stakeholder setup in which organized farmers replaced the agency. Regime change to multiparty democracy and policy change toward economic liberalization then opened a window of opportunity that the government used to consolidate the reforms and the new balance of power. The success of the reform process lies in the way Mali?s government came to commit to the irrigation reforms. The paper indicates how commitment by other governments may be achieved by using the same and other tools. Making Large Irrigation Schemes Work is a useful resource for professionals involved in the transfer of management authority from government to user associations."

The Political Economy of Water Pricing Reforms
The Political Economy of Water Pricing Reforms

Author: Ariel Dinar

Publisher: Elsevier

Published: 2000

Total Pages: 200

ISBN-13: 9780195215946

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Lately our world has witnessed massive changes and reforms in various sectors in many countries, developing and developed alike. Institutional and pricing reforms in the water sector are also part of that recent trend. They are led by the recognition of a need to respond to increased scarcity and deteriorated quality. Is the water sector different than other sectors, as some claim? Should reforms in the water sector be designed and implemented differently than reforms of a similar type, in other sectors? The Political Economy of Water Pricing Reforms answers these questions by providing various analytical frameworks that allow comparison across various conditions, and by actually comparing reform processes under various conditions in different countries. This book demonstrates the common threads that characterize pricing reforms in the water sector by analyzing various aspects of the reforms in the irrigation and urban subsectors of 10 countries. Cases from Morocco, Senegal, Honduras, Belgium, Australia, Brazil, Mexico, Pakistan, Yemen, and the United States illustrate the difficulties of designing and implementing "optimal" pricing reforms and explain how reform outcomes fall short of the original objective. "This book should be on the must reading list for anyone interested in water pricing and how to reform water rights systems to achieve increased economic efficiency as well as a legitimate and equitable system of property rights." Elinor Ostrom, Co-Director, Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis and Co-Director, Center for the Study of Institutions, Population, and Environmental Change, Indiana University

Water Politics and Development Cooperation
Water Politics and Development Cooperation

Author: Waltina Scheumann

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2008-09-22

Total Pages: 431

ISBN-13: 354076707X

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The importance of the political sphere for understanding and solving water sector problems is the basic rationale of this book, which is the outcome of the Fifth Dialogues on Water, organised at the German Development Institute, Bonn. These dialogues, unlike earlier ones, focused on the political processes of policy formulation and the strategic behaviour of the actors involved. Specific attention is devoted to implications for development cooperation.

Water, Works and Wages
Water, Works and Wages

Author: Joost Oorthuizen

Publisher: Orient Blackswan

Published: 2003

Total Pages: 376

ISBN-13: 9788125025108

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Series: Wageningen University Water Resources Series. This book investigates one of the four sub-systems of the largest irrigation project in the Philippines. Based on extensive field research, its aim is to examine the everyday realities of irrigation management reform. The author covers the effects of reform policies on all levels, from the farmers, the fieldworkers and engineers, to the local politicians. While most studies of irrigation reform simply cover the policies adopted and their outcomes, this book looks in more detail at the manner in which those policies are put into effect. It places irrigation reform in a socio-political context, and shows that results are highly unequal due to factors such as political patronage and connections of family and friendship.

The Green Revolution
The Green Revolution

Author: Patrick Kilby

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2019-03-04

Total Pages: 118

ISBN-13: 0429575297

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This book reviews the Green Revolution, starting with its inception and development from the 1940s to the 1970s, and leading to what is commonly referred to as a second Green Revolution in the 2000s. Building on the historical assessment, it draws insights for contemporary policy debates and demonstrates important lessons for the here and now. ‘Green Revolution’ refers to the technical measures employed to increase food (particularly grain) production, based mainly on improved seed varieties for higher yields and pest resistance. For it to be successful the Green Revolution often required land reform, investments in irrigation and fertilizer supply that were not available to women and marginal farmers. This book analyses three underlying principles that have guided green revolutions: the political environment in which they were set; how they contributed to both the successes and challenges the Green Revolution continues to face; and the systemic institutional barriers for access to these agricultural production advances, with a focus on how gender relations limit the inclusion of women even when they are the principle cultivators and farm managers. The book draws on experiences in Mexico, India and China, examining government policy, the role of the family farm, and key issues around the inclusion of women. In doing so, this book connects the history of the Green Revolution with contemporary policy debates on the developing world, particularly in relation to Africa and Asia, around foreign aid and agricultural research. It also specifically establishes that greater inclusivity for women and other marginalised farming communities will significantly enhance the effectiveness of these programs. Interlinking themes of development policy, gender, and agricultural research, this book will be of great interest to students and scholars of agricultural development, food security, and sustainable development, as well as policymakers and practitioners working in international aid and agri-food policies.

Paths to the Emerging State in Asia and Africa
Paths to the Emerging State in Asia and Africa

Author: Keijiro Otsuka

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2019-01-16

Total Pages: 305

ISBN-13: 9811331316

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This book is open access under a CC BY-NC-ND license. This book addresses the issue of how a country, which was incorporated into the world economy as a periphery, could make a transition to the emerging state, capable of undertaking the task of economic development and industrialization. It offers historical and contemporary case studies of transition, as well as the international background under which such a transition was successfully made (or delayed), by combining the approaches of economic history and development economics. Its aim is to identify relevant historical contexts, that is, the ‘initial conditions’ and internal and external forces which governed the transition. It also aims to understand what current low-income developing countries require for their transition. Three economic driving forces for the transition are identified. They are: (1) labor-intensive industrialization, which offers ample employment opportunities for labor force; (2) international trade, which facilitates efficient international division of labor; and (3) agricultural development, which improves food security by increasing supply of staple foods. The book presents a bold account of each driver for the transition.

The Political Economy of Agricultural Policy Reform in India
The Political Economy of Agricultural Policy Reform in India

Author: Regina Birner

Publisher: Intl Food Policy Res Inst

Published: 2011

Total Pages: 261

ISBN-13: 0896291723

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Agricultural policy reform is one of the major challenges facing India today. Such reform is required to reduce poverty through faster agricultural growth and to promote more sustainable use of natural resources while ensuring food security. Subsidy policies that promote the use of fertilizer and of electricity for groundwater irrigation are in particular need of reform. While subsidies for these two inputs played a crucial role in achieving India's Green Revolution, they have been criticized during the past decade for benefitting large-scale farmers more than smallholders, placing a fiscal burden on the state, and having negative environmental effects. By analyzing the evolution of these input subsidy policies and examining the political processes involved in efforts to reform them, this study throws new light on the factors that have so far prevented a move toward more pro-poor and environmentally sustainable agricultural input policies in India. The authors show that electoral politics, institutional factors, and policy paradigms or belief systems all play an important role in blocking reform. They identify several policy reform options as well as political strategies that can overcome past obstacles to reform. Community-based policy solutions, new coalitions for policy reform, fresh approaches to the policy debate, innovative and consensus-oriented forms of deliberation, and effective use of research-based knowledge can all make positive contributions to Indian policy reform. The analyses and proposals presented in this study will be a valuable resource for policymakers and stakeholders concerned with the politics of agricultural development.

Technocrats and the Politics of Drought and Development in Twentieth-Century Brazil
Technocrats and the Politics of Drought and Development in Twentieth-Century Brazil

Author: Eve E. Buckley

Publisher: UNC Press Books

Published: 2017-07-28

Total Pages: 299

ISBN-13: 1469634317

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Eve E. Buckley’s study of twentieth-century Brazil examines the nation’s hard social realities through the history of science, focusing on the use of technology and engineering as vexed instruments of reform and economic development. Nowhere was the tension between technocratic optimism and entrenched inequality more evident than in the drought-ridden Northeast sertão, plagued by chronic poverty, recurrent famine, and mass migrations. Buckley reveals how the physicians, engineers, agronomists, and mid-level technocrats working for federal agencies to combat drought were pressured by politicians to seek out a technological magic bullet that would both end poverty and obviate the need for land redistribution to redress long-standing injustices.