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Public participation is crucial to improving the performance of water governance systems, especially in a governance model dominated by a top-down hierarchical structure. Public concerns, as a vital form of public participation, have been acknowledged as an essential component in contributing to water governance. However, few studies explore the varying effects of diverse public concerns in leading to different water governance outcomes. This study addresses this gap by exploring the direct and indirect effects of water-related public concerns on water pollution control and governments' pollution mitigating actions, using citizens' water-related posts crawled from China's social media. Results show that public water-related concerns contribute to water governance both through its direct effects on reducing water pollution and indirect effects by promoting policy actions. Specifically, the concerns related to water pollution hazards, water pollution monitoring, prevention products, and water pollution control measures have more positive impacts on water pollution reduction compared to other types of concern. Meanwhile, public concerns demonstrate stronger effects in triggering economic-related and infrastructure-related water pollution mitigation actions. This study provides nuanced insights to understand the role of public participation in improving water governance, the findings of which are insightful to enhance accountability of water governance systems through a bottom-up approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Valuing water is receiving increasing attention within the global water policy agenda as a new water management paradigm. However, it is not yet clear how it can be operationalized in local water management contexts. We apply the Value Landscapes Approach as a conceptual framework to show how water-related preferences are informed by underlying assigned/water values and governance-related values and how these values may explain three different visions for water management among professional respondents in a Northern Kenyan case study. Through making shared and conflicting values explicit, these insights may serve as a foundation for addressing water conflicts in practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is debate about whether complex problems should be addressed technocratically or whether they should be politicized. While many tend to favour technocratic decision-making and evidence based policy, for others politicization of policy problems is fundamental for significant policy change. But politicization does not always lead to problem solving. Nor is it always necessary. This paper addresses the question: Under what circumstances should problems be politicized, and what is the effect of such politicization? It adds politicization, through windows of opportunity, to the split ladder of participation to assess policy change through two case studies: successful and unsuccessful constitutional change in Ecuador (2008) and Chile respectively (2022). It argues that where there is no agreement on either science or policy, politicization is required to address lack of consensus in values, but constitutional protection is needed to protect minorities and the vulnerable, their access and human right to water. De-politicization stymies policy change potentially harming democracy. This paper argues for a citizen engaged exploration of the complex problem of climate change and its impacts on water, but a targeted politicization coincident with, but developed well in advance of, windows of opportunity. Moreover, policy framing correlated with complex problems continues to be a key consideration. Furthermore, alliances of disparate actors, elections of new political leaders and considerations of property rights and justice issues are paramount. Significant constitutional policy change reflects social learning, but subsequent court actions by policy entrepreneurs is required to effectively implement this change. Framing constitutional change to protect rights to water and effect international agreements (including the Warsaw International Mechanism under the climate change regime) advances water justice and may increase success. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Globally, water governance struggles to reconcile increased demands on water resources with climate change–induced reductions in supply, making climate adaptation in water governance a pressing concern. The Resist-Accept-Direct (RAD) framework has emerged as a climate adaptation tool designed to help make adaptation decisions. However, there is limited understanding of social and political factors, which are critical in driving RAD decisions. This paper explores how communities are employing RAD to make climate adaptation decisions, using a case study of the Goulburn-Murray Resilience Strategy (the Strategy); a community-led strategy that uses a version of the RAD framework to build regional resilience in the Goulburn-Murray Irrigation District (GMID) in Australia’s Murray-Darling Basin (MDB). The Strategy focuses on building socio-economic, rather than ecological, resilience, making this research a valuable contribution to RAD literature. To apply the RAD framework to socio-economic adaptation, we adapted the framework to include IPCC language around incremental, transformational, planned, and autonomous adaptation. With the GMID considered a leader of resilience thinking in Australia, the Strategy may help decision-makers address water overallocation and contested governance in the MDB, and provide lessons for water governance globally. Data analysed from 20 semi-structured interviews with people involved with the Strategy revealed two main findings: (1) Communities and governments prioritise different actions under the RAD framework. Governments, particularly at the state level, preference incremental planned adaptation to maintain the status quo (resist), over incremental autonomous adaptation to changing conditions (accept), and transformational planned adaptation at various scales (direct). (2) Community and government actors perceive that factors driving governments’ preference for incremental-resist adaptation include electoral short-termism, linear planning, and conservative government culture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Enabling diverse actors to address interlinked sustainability issues is important and challenging. This paper focuses on how to design a dialogue-based knowledge co-production process to nurture collective action. Using the conceptualization of systems, target, and operational knowledge as the guiding framework, we designed and combined different complementary activities to invite actors to look at a wicked problem through multiple lenses and reflect on their own positions, perspectives, knowledge, and values. With a carefully documented workshop series held with local actors on Öland, Sweden, as our empirical case study, we demonstrate how we moved from exploring the multifunctionality of landscapes and understanding actors' different values, preferences, and priorities, to developing four strategies for effectively accelerating and expanding efforts to adapt to climate change. Our study reveals how the process of mobilizing, articulating, and connecting individually held systems, target, and operational knowledge nurtures collective action. It also leverages dialogue-based processes as cornerstones in addressing sustainability challenges in an inclusive and equitable way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

After Tunisia's independence from France in 1956, the country was engaged in what has been termed the “supply management policy”, that is, a maximum mobilization of water resources through large‐scale modern hydraulic infrastructure. Towards the beginning of the 1980s, the country entered a crisis and had to adopt in 1986, under pressure from the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, a “Structural Adjustment Program” (SAP) that prioritized measures to improve economic efficiency and liberalize the economy. Since then, Tunisian water policy has progressively shifted towards “Integrated Water Resources Management” (IWRM). This review critically analyzes the water governance discourses that have framed these policy interventions. I will draw on academic research and official and civil society reports to suggest that these discourses have been “rendered technical”, stripping issues of any political (and therefore conflicting) character. When rendered technical discourses raise development projects and policies above the terrain of political contestation, the possibilities of action available to those opposed to them become limited. This depoliticization of development interventions through technical discourses narrows the public space of democratic debate. I will also argue that the “technification” (rendering technical) process is reversible. Opposition groups can challenge technical discourses with a critical approach that can reconfigure and alter the trajectory of governmental programs. However, critical discourses can, in turn, be rendered technical.This article is categorized under: Human Water > Water Governance Human Water > Rights to Water [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The extent to which rules in a governing arrangement addresses its local conditions is usually defined in the environmental governance literature as the problem of fit. Actors in governing arrangements with decision‐making authority are capable of choosing and designing specific policy tools in order to address specific policy problems. In this manuscript, we combine insights from the literature on policy design and the literature on common‐pool resource governance to assess the extent to which Nebraska's Natural Resources Districts (NRDs), which were created to provide context‐specific solutions to local water problems, design plans, and programs that fit their social‐ecological contexts. Using semi‐automated text analysis approaches and Qualitative Comparative Analysis, we assess how the design of plans and programs created by NRDs vary, to fit their social‐ecological contexts. Results indicate that the biophysical context plays a role in shaping the content of plans and programs, but that broader top‐down institutional mandates may play an even stronger role in shaping the outputs produced by NRDs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Effective and sustainable water resource management requires flexibility and adaptation to local contexts. Our study analyzes the emergence and evolution of local water self-governing associations, reviewing how their struggles and conflicts, both with the public sector and among locals themselves, have been pivotal to achieving agreements and actions towards sustainable water management. Using an adapted version of the Combined Institutional Analysis and Development (IAD) and social–ecological system (SES) framework, also known as CIS, we conducted a comparative analysis of two distinct Chilean cases. This research highlights the critical role of historical factors alongside institutional support, political landscapes, and financial realities in shaping current water management practices. The findings suggest that when the actors are aligned and actions are taken to support local water user management, more efficient, sustainable, and less conflict-ridden water resource management occurs. Furthermore, this study reveals how the experiences, struggles, and successes of these local user associations have shaped national policies, particularly regarding the development of monitoring mechanisms and the promotion of public–private cooperation in water governance. These efforts have not only fostered more resilient water management systems but have also demonstrated the power of grassroots organizations in shaping broader sustainable policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In summer 2021, the Dutch Province of Limburg faced an acute high-water event caused by two days of heavy rainfall, resulting in €383 million worth of damage. Afterwards, various policy actors organised a number of evaluations. This study analyses these evaluations and the long-term lessons drawn from this flood event. Dealing with climate change requires insights into how lessons from acute shocks such as floods can stimulate the anticipation of climate change and solutions that can cope with future extremes. This study therefore applies policy learning theory—single, double and triple loop learning—to different layers of flood safety to analyse the extent to which governments prepare for future events and how. The results show that pre-2021 water and flood risk management policies—our point of comparison to derive what lessons emerge after the 2021 flood—focused mostly on flood prevention (layer 1) and from 1996 onwards with the start of the Room for the River programme also on spatial planning (layer 2), without paying much attention to crisis management (layer 3). Based on the 2021 flood, the official evaluation committee recommends adding two more layers to the multilayer flood safety approach: increasing water awareness (layer 0 as a base layer for the other layers) and focusing on climate-robust recovery after floods (layer 4) to improve long-term robustness. Based on our research, triple-loop learning as the deepest type of learning appeared in the form of applying the Room for the River approach to the tributary brooks systems. To prepare for the future, policy evaluations recommend improving stress tests to better deal with climate change. Futures scenarios and visions for the future are also recommended. Creating future visions can help to steer changes in existing land use and re-think areas to build or to use for water retention, for example. Governments are advised to strengthen their anticipatory capacities as part of their crisis management response and recovery systems. Furthermore, governments will need to apply the different layers for multilayer safety in an integrated way to ensure that regions are able to prepare for future floods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The protection of Chile's rivers is a matter of ongoing public and constitutional interest in the wake of Chile's failed 2019–2024 constitutional reforms. In this article we review and evaluate opportunities for greater legal protection and restoration of rivers in Chile. The legal analysis was complemented by a survey of social attitudes about river protection needs and several interviews with key experts and stakeholders, which found strong concern for enhanced river protection mechanisms in Chile. We conclude by outlining critical pathways towards durable legal protections for the future of Chile's rivers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article sought to analyse the gender dimensions in communally managed water schemes in rural Uganda. Taking two rural villages as empirical referents, the study used multi-methods of data collection and a gender-based analysis to interrogate the challenges to equitable access and decision-making in rural-based water schemes. The analysis reveals that, despite the existing policy and legislative regime, access to water for women is severely constrained, and their level of decision-making in communally managed water schemes is remarkably low. The article holds that women's participation is critical for the much-needed collective action towards community-based water governance, gender equity, and empowerment. Consequently, the barriers to sustainable water access and effective women's participation can be addressed through significant investments in systematic water institutional reforms, targeted capacity-building initiatives, and plugging existing policy monitoring and implementation gaps at all levels. There is a need to address the policy reality gap regarding ownership of productive resources for women as a key strand towards addressing the equity challenges at different levels of water governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores how participatory science helps address water supply challenges in developing countries suffering from water shortages. In the absence of technical capacity to monitor the water supply system, this participation constitutes an excellent alternative to involve citizens in data collection and evaluation of the quality of the water service. The paper presents the design and implementation of a participatory science platform that enables data about the quality of the water supply in the city of Kharas in Palestine to be collected. Thanks to significant citizen participation, the study demonstrates that participatory science enhances the management of the water supply system and public awareness and engagement. Temporal and spatial analysis of collected data helped us to better understand the water supply system and identify the causes of the water service degradation. The study shows that the success of citizen participation requires cooperation between the water staff and citizens, including continuous dialogue and training and the construction of a friendly citizen participation platform. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract In summer 2021, the Dutch Province of Limburg faced an acute high-water event caused by two days of heavy rainfall, resulting in €383 million worth of damage. Afterwards, various policy actors organised a number of evaluations. This study analyses these evaluations and the long-term lessons drawn from this flood event. Dealing with climate change requires insights into how lessons from acute shocks such as floods can stimulate the anticipation of climate change and solutions that can cope with future extremes. This study therefore applies policy learning theory—single, double and triple loop learning—to different layers of flood safety to analyse the extent to which governments prepare for future events and how. The results show that pre-2021 water and flood risk management policies—our point of comparison to derive what lessons emerge after the 2021 flood—focused mostly on flood prevention (layer 1) and from 1996 onwards with the start of the Room for the River programme also on spatial planning (layer 2), without paying much attention to crisis management (layer 3). Based on the 2021 flood, the official evaluation committee recommends adding two more layers to the multilayer flood safety approach: increasing water awareness (layer 0 as a base layer for the other layers) and focusing on climate-robust recovery after floods (layer 4) to improve long-term robustness. Based on our research, triple-loop learning as the deepest type of learning appeared in the form of applying the Room for the River approach to the tributary brooks systems. To prepare for the future, policy evaluations recommend improving stress tests to better deal with climate change. Futures scenarios and visions for the future are also recommended. Creating future visions can help to steer changes in existing land use and re-think areas to build or to use for water retention, for example. Governments are advised to strengthen their anticipatory capacities as part of their crisis management response and recovery systems. Furthermore, governments will need to apply the different layers for multilayer safety in an integrated way to ensure that regions are able to prepare for future floods.

The present paper analyzes the relationship between perceived public service performance, trust in the government, and citizens' willingness to participate in water governance with insights into broader state–citizen relations. The study is based on a household survey conducted in June 2022 that employed a multistage stratified random sampling within the Greater Visakhapatnam Municipal Corporation limits of Andhra Pradesh, a southern state of India. The analysis reveals that citizens' perception of water service delivery performance positively affects trust in water managers while negatively affecting their willingness to participate in water governance. In contrast, the citizens' trust in water managers positively correlates to their willingness to participate. Moreover, the identified correlations among the three variables elucidate a circular pattern. The intricate circular pattern observed among these three variables complicates the citizen–state relationship. Understanding and navigating this complex web of relationships is crucial for policymakers and researchers seeking to enhance citizen participation and trust in water services. The circular nature of these interactions underscores the need for holistic and integrated approaches in addressing the multifaceted dynamics within the citizen–state relationship. HIGHLIGHTS Investigates the interplay among citizens'perceptions of water service delivery, trust in water managers, and willingness to participate.; Establishes evidence for mutual reciprocity among the three essential aspects of water governance.; Contributes empirically from a city in the Global South.; The study findings are instrumental in contributing to effective water management practices, strengthening the citizen–state relationship.;

Research Purpose: Water is a natural resource essential to human development, with multiple uses, which generates pollution processes, with environmental, economic, and social consequences. This work aims to evaluate the social participation in the management of water resources in Portugal and Brazil. Methodology: For this, we adopted the methodological procedures of systematic literature review, investigation of the documentation on the Council of the Hydrographic Region (CRH) of Center/Portugal and the Hydrographic Basin Committee (CBH) of the Apodi/Mossoró River in Brazil and obtaining field data with the application of interviews to the members of these two institutions. Findings: It was found that the participation of the members of CRH Center/Portugal and the CBH of the Apodi/Mossoró River in Brazil refers to the similarities in the degree of participation, diversity of the segment, number of members, participation of civil society, and participation of the private sector; however, they are distinct concerning the degree of interest, ways of choosing the members, their level of knowledge, the interaction between the members and the participation of the public authorities. Originality/Value: Therefore, it is recommended for the evolution of these management models a deeper knowledge of their representatives, through the diagnosis of the socioeconomic profile, as well as their environmental perception.

The politics of quantifying water are nothing new to the state of New Mexico. Indigenous views of water as integral, holistic, and bound to the land were shaken by Spanish Colonial norms of water infrastructure, metrics, and institutions. A second abrupt shift into Anglo-American water metrics tied to western homesteading emerged at the start of the 20th century. The Anglo-American system of assigning private use rights to water has resulted in more bureaucratic metrics far removed from either indigenous or ─ understandings of water. Interestingly, Spanish and Anglo-American forms of settler-colonial water metrics were not completely incommensurate in their intent despite their qualitative and quantitative differences. Surcos, a qualitative metric of water for the Spanish, and American acre feet both measure the amount of water needed to cover an area of land and were employed for active land settlement. It was not in the award phase of settler-colonial water rights that water metrics became most problematic. Based on over a decade of ethnographic work in the state, I argue here that the current politics and contestation of water quantification in the state of New Mexico are driven by changes to water governance when new technologies and policy measures are used to govern and monitor water users less transparently.

Water is a central ingredient of all economic activities. Even so, water-using corporations were long absent from the theoretical and practical developments of water management, governance and policy. The past 15 years, however, have seen the emergence, proliferation and gradual maturation of global initiatives, guidelines and tools that focus on the role of business and their value chains under the banners of corporate water stewardship and water security. This article takes stock of the available literature and reviews the development to date. It traces the origins of key concepts and initiatives that are part of this new corporate engagement in water policy and governance, and looks at the landscape and corporate-level drivers of the phenomena. The paper reviews the evolution of the associated theory and practice; it also examines the impact of corporate engagement in water on business strategies and actions, and observes the influence it has had on stakeholders and settings from the national to the global level. While the available evidence base is still fragmented, the review findings confirm the previously documented controversies of operating at the public–private interface of water. Among water-using companies, the water stewardship approach is increasingly positioned as a means of achieving collective water security, merging these two fields; in practice, however, the results indicate still-narrow gains. The article concludes with a call for a comprehensive evaluation of corporate water initiatives and for a transdisciplinary research agenda that steers the engagement towards more equitable and sustainable outcomes.

Insufficient funding for water infrastructure has become a notable challenge for China and other developing countries. In light of marketization and globalization, financialization has emerged as a potential avenue to address the financial difficulties. This study employs the PMC index model and cluster analysis method to quantitatively analyze the financialization of water infrastructure in China through a lens of public policy lens. The findings suggest that financialization has become a significant trend in water infrastructure, with public policy playing a critical role in water infrastructure development. This study contributes to the novel possibilities for studying water infrastructure financialization and offers a reference to policymakers and professionals for optimizing water infrastructure development. HIGHLIGHTS Financing is a key challenge facing global water infrastructure development.; This study employs the PMC index model and cluster analysis method to quantitatively analyze the financialization of water infrastructure in China through a lens of public policy lens.; Financialization has become a significant trend in water infrastructure, with public policy playing a critical role in water infrastructure development.;

The issue of water resources is a perennial topic for achieving human sustainable development goals. Over the last decade, a renewed watershed governance regime, River Chief System emerged to solve the issue of river pollutions in China, and attracted attentions across the world. In this review article, we profiled River Chief System, including its origin, principle and characteristics, and found that the primary feature of River Chief System is its hierarchical structure and the implementation of responsibility. By triangulating bibliometric measurement of the Citespace tool, database of the Web of Science and the China National Knowledge Infrastructure, the development, research trends and hotspots of River Chief System research have been reviewed systematically. The number of publications of River Chief System is showing a significant growing trend, and their foci are diverse: water environmental effects, mechanisms of River Chief System, public participation and supervision and localization of River Chief System, and the implement of "One River, One Policy" plan. Finally, theoretical and practical suggestions for the future study of River Chief System are proposed. This review systematically introduces China's experience on river management to the world, which is of great significance for the world to fully understand the River Chief System of China and further improve and promote it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Water reforms fail mainly because stubborn contextual constraints are not effectively considered. This study proposes a context-sensitive water governance assessment by designing a comparative approach within a case study and making inductive analytic generalizations. The framework is applied empirically to the Zayandeh Rud basin in the rentier state of Iran. The results indicate that the rentier-weak state context has led to centralized rent-seeking governance and limited implementation capacity – characteristics of the entire country, not just the water sector. Water issues will, therefore, require context-sensitive, problem-driven analysis beyond addressing water governance challenges. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the events that originated an integrated water resources management (IWRM) model called Consorcio de Aguas de la Marina Baja (CAMB), in the province of Alicante (Spain), in 1978. The impact of tourism and population growth in the second half of the 20th century motivated the need for new management formulas seeking a balance between available resources and a greater need for water resources. The emergence of mass tourism in Benidorm at the end of the 1950s generated a great imbalance between the needs and availability of water resources. Also considering the effect of periods of severe drought, the solution to the deficit was found in the principles of institutional economics and circular water management. Water infrastructure and technology are elements of great importance in this model, allowing the exchange of natural water for reclaimed water, as a result of previous agreements between traditional irrigators and supply users of coastal populations. Its success has guaranteed the coexistence of traditional agriculture and the consolidated tourism activity, making possible the conservation of the cultural landscape. The historical and economic analysis of the model that led to the creation of CAMB can be applied to other regions facing similar challenges. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Water governance and ecosystem function in the Canadian prairies are in a state of crisis. Compounding this crisis, and adding complexity, is the relationship between the water governance authority of the state with Canada's First Peoples. Meaningful engagement of Indigenous peoples in water governance is a necessary requisite to effective water management. This research characterizes the extent and depth of Indigenous engagement in watershed planning in the province of Manitoba, Canada, and examines the degree to which Indigenous rights are incorporated in that engagement. To do so, we analyze evidence of First Nation people's inclusion in water governance, planning, and management processes. We conducted latent and manifest content analyses of watershed plans to identify the themes and frequency of content related to First Nations and Métis engagement and triangulated results with key informant semi-structured interviews and document reviews of water governance policies and legislation. Overall, we find that Indigenous engagement in Manitoba water governance has increased over time but is still lacking adequate recognition and implementation of Aboriginal and Treaty rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the processes by which "stakeholder" status is constructed, and the importance of sense of place to that construction in collaborative water resource governance processes. Water management often involves collaborative governance, but there can be differences between who has an interest in the outcome, and who is formally invited to participate as a "stakeholder." We examine a case study of a collaborative water governance process in Central Oregon, and found that existing models of stakeholder formation present in scholarly literature did not fully explain the dynamics of stakeholder participation. We propose a two-step "Interest-Participation" model of stakeholder formation: to be considered stakeholders, a group must not only have an interest in the outcome but must actively navigate barriers to participation. We moreover argue that collaborative engagement is an embodiment of sense of place, emphasizing the importance of competing place meanings in resource governance processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Water is a central ingredient of all economic activities. Even so, water-using corporations were long absent from the theoretical and practical developments of water management, governance and policy. The past 15 years, however, have seen the emergence, proliferation and gradual maturation of global initiatives, guidelines and tools that focus on the role of business and their value chains under the banners of corporate water stewardship and water security. This article takes stock of the available literature and reviews the development to date. It traces the origins of key concepts and initiatives that are part of this new corporate engagement in water policy and governance, and looks at the landscape and corporate-level drivers of the phenomena. The paper reviews the evolution of the associated theory and practice; it also examines the impact of corporate engagement in water on business strategies and actions, and observes the influence it has had on stakeholders and settings from the national to the global level. While the available evidence base is still fragmented, the review findings confirm the previously documented controversies of operating at the public–private interface of water. Among water-using companies, the water stewardship approach is increasingly positioned as a means of achieving collective water security, merging these two fields; in practice, however, the results indicate still-narrow gains. The article concludes with a call for a comprehensive evaluation of corporate water initiatives and for a transdisciplinary research agenda that steers the engagement towards more equitable and sustainable outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The politics of quantifying water are nothing new to the state of New Mexico. Indigenous views of water as integral, holistic, and bound to the land were shaken by Spanish Colonial norms of water infrastructure, metrics, and institutions. A second abrupt shift into Anglo-American water metrics tied to western homesteading emerged at the start of the 20th century. The Anglo-American system of assigning private use rights to water has resulted in more bureaucratic metrics far removed from either indigenous or ─ understandings of water. Interestingly, Spanish and Anglo-American forms of settler-colonial water metrics were not completely incommensurate in their intent despite their qualitative and quantitative differences. Surcos, a qualitative metric of water for the Spanish, and American acre feet both measure the amount of water needed to cover an area of land and were employed for active land settlement. It was not in the award phase of settler-colonial water rights that water metrics became most problematic. Based on over a decade of ethnographic work in the state, I argue here that the current politics and contestation of water quantification in the state of New Mexico are driven by changes to water governance when new technologies and policy measures are used to govern and monitor water users less transparently. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Worldwide, more integrated and spatially embedded forms of flood risk management have been advocated. In the Netherlands, this 'spatial turn' can be associated with a quest for spatial quality, i.e. making use of existing landscape values to create more liveable, aesthetic and sustainable flood risk management solutions. Reflecting on Dutch flood risk management practice, this paper inventorizes which policy instruments are currently used to strengthen spatial quality, and how involved actors view these instruments. We present empirical insights on common concerns, standpoints and dilemmas from the Dutch Flood Protection Programme (DFPP), a large-scale reinforcement operation to climate-proof the Netherlands' main flood defences by 2050. Spatial quality here remains a rather ambiguous policy objective, lacking a legally binding framework. Using the NATO-policy instruments' typology as a starting point, and based on a co-learning process between science and practice, we present an instruments palette that can be used to strengthen spatial quality in flood risk management. Our findings reveal that the DFPP makes use of rather 'soft' policy instruments. The actual achievement of spatial quality goals seems to depend largely on the combined project team competencies, guidance and support provided by responsible water authorities, and commitment of other project partners. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Achieving water security requires action at all levels of governance, and cooperation among state and non-state actors, including civil society. However, in many places, participatory arrangements to enable cooperation, such as river basin committees or water user groups, have not been created, due to resource constraints or scepticism regarding their effectiveness. Here, we develop a typology of five key 'governance actions' that non-state actors may undertake to address environmental problems. We apply this typology to empirical findings from a water scarcity situation in Johor, Malaysia, where subnational civil society actors undertook a range of responses. The analysis reveals that, despite the absence of formal engagement mechanisms, civil society positively contributed to the governance of water security through 'defining issues', 'creating and sharing knowledge' and 'taking independent action' that could potentially inform wider practice, but faced challenges in 'monitoring and evaluating' or otherwise providing a critical perspective on impacts of water insecurity. The findings indicate possibilities for place-based and interest-based partnerships between government and civil society, and for supporting vertical relationships among civil society actors operating at different levels of governance. The study contributes to debates around power relations, knowledge sharing, and decision making across multilevel environmental governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Multi-stakeholder participation processes in watershed management face challenges due to limited monitoring and baseline data, resulting in a lack of awareness among stakeholders about the current state of the watershed. This knowledge gap often leads to conflicts of interest, wherein the broader impacts of individual decisions are overlooked. To overcome these limitations, this paper explores the design and implementation of a Serious Game (SG) aimed at coproducing a watershed management plan at the basin scale within the specific context of the Campoalegre River basin in Colombia. By providing an interactive platform, the SG facilitates collaboration between local actors, who may be unfamiliar with existing watershed plans, and decision-makers. The goal is to create a participatory space where stakeholders can comprehend the watershed management plan structure and prioritize actions based on various climatic, social, and economic conditions. Following the application of the SG, stakeholders demonstrated an improved understanding of the basin, fostering increased participation, open debate, and the proposal of actions. These outcomes serve as valuable inputs for the implementation of water management planning policies, showcasing the potential of SGs in bridging knowledge gaps, and fostering effective multi-stakeholder engagement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bangladesh, a riverine nation with rivers originating beyond its borders, experiences a climatic paradox characterized by excessive monsoon rainfall (June to September) and minimal precipitation during winter (December to February). This climatic duality leads to recurring hydrological disasters, including floods, river erosion, and droughts, causing substantial losses in agriculture, fisheries, navigation, ecology, and biodiversity. Effective water governance is imperative to mitigate these economic and environmental impacts. This study aims to evaluate Bangladesh’s current state of water governance and identify gaps in existing policies and regulations related to water resources management (WRM). It is achieved through a comprehensive review of existing laws, acts, regulations, and policies related to water governance. The study reveals that policy documents developed over the last three decades, aimed at enhancing water governance and reducing vulnerabilities to droughts, floods, and riverbank erosion, have identified only a limited number of critical policy gaps in WRM. The government should prioritize gradually decentralizing management policies to strengthen climate resilience in coastal regions. This research offers insights into improving water governance and WRM and contributes to reducing hydrological disasters in Bangladesh. Additionally, it provides valuable guidance for addressing challenges related to upstream transboundary rivers and formulating future strategies and action plans. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Global water systems are facing unprecedented pressures, including climate change‐driven drought and escalating flood risk, environmental contamination, and over allocation. Water management and governance typically lack integration across spatial scales, including relationships between surface and ground water systems. They also routinely ignore connectivity across temporal scales, including the need for intergenerational water planning. As a global and interdisciplinary group of scientists, we seek to highlight how power and scale dynamics influence and determine water outcomes. We argue that attending to complex water systems challenges requires understanding the function and influence of power at different temporal and spatial scales. Building this understanding is key to designing multi‐scalar, reflexive, and pluralistic policy solutions that avoid ineffective or unintended outcomes. We use a co‐learning process to reveal important lessons for the challenge of interdisciplinary research and set a pluralist agenda for understanding power and scale in future water governance.This article is categorized under: Human Water > Water Governance Human Water > Water as Imagined and Represented Human Water > Methods [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The article investigates the evolution of rural water governance in the People's Republic of China through a historical review of its water governance transformations, including the ideology, institutions, and discourses. It is argued that the evolution of agricultural water management and rural drinking water development in China is inextricably linked to addressing political legitimacy. Rural water governance, is shown to be intertwined with state identity and citizenship formation, in order to produce and control hydrosocial territorial objects and subjects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Water governance is an important issue of the modernization of the national governance system and governance capacity, and is also an critical guarantee for high-quality development and the Chinese path to modernization. The detailed identification and systematic evaluation of the Chinese path to modernization of water governance is the key work to promote the modernization and sustainable development of China. A comprehensive evaluation system for the Chinese path to modernization of water governance is constructed from the demensions of population, economy, coordination, and ecology under the guideline of the characteristics of the Chinese path to modernization, and the spatial-temporal characteristics of the development of the Chinese path to modernization of water governance are explored by spatial analysis methods based on the provincial-level panel data from 2008 to 2021, and the influencing factors of the Chinese path to modernization of water governance are analyzed by using the grey correlation model. The results show that the development of the Chinese path to modernization of water governance is overall on the rise; The regional heterogeneity of the Chinese path to modernization of water governance is significant, showing a gradient pattern of "high in the east, followed by the middle and low in the west", and the regional gap has an expanding trend. Indicators such as urbanization rate, urban water access rate, urban sewage treatment rate, per capita comprehensive water consumption, total population, proportion of ecological water, and water consumption per 10 000 yuan of industrial added value have the highest correlation with the Chinese path to modernization of water governance. This study suggests that differentiated, targeted and forward-looking development strategies and policies should be formulated for the Chinese path to modernization of water governance for various regions. The western region should further increase the ecological water, and the central region can improve the modern development level of water governance by optimizing the per capita comprehensive water consumption. The research enriches the theoretical system of the Chinese path to modernization, and provides a scientific basis for the development of Chinese water governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Study area: Iran. Study focus: Hamedan-Bahar plain is one of the important plains in the west of Iran, which is facing a shortage of water resources and excessive extraction of groundwater resources. The purpose of this article is to identify and evaluate the status of sustainability governance indicators using the knowledge of local experts, which can be an effective step towards the sustainable management of groundwater resources. In this paper, we apply Ostrom’s Social-Ecological Systems Framework (SESF) as a diagnostic tool with 52 indicators to assess the sustainability of groundwater resources. New hydrological insights for the region: Based on key informant interviews with local experts and stakeholders, we use the TOPSIS technique and the Shannon Entropy methodologies to weigh and rank indicators influencing sustainability. Findings revealed that the indicators within the category Resource Systems (RS) and Resource Units (RU) with values of 0.74, and 0.70, are the most stable contributing factors to local sustainability, respectively. In contrast, the Governance System (GS), Actor (A), and Interaction (I) first-tier variables were evaluated as less stable, along with Outcomes (O). This suggests that social factors and diverse outcomes may need further attention in the region to ensure management and policy development that can better enable sustainable outcomes. This analysis also demonstrates the usefulness of a comprehensive science-based framework for organizing, analyzing, and presenting a wide range of complex information to inform policymakers and planners.

The water-draw and utilization assessment (WDUA) policy is crucial for ensuring sustainable water development and good water governance in China. It consists of the WDUA in construction projects (WDUA-CP) and WDUA in urban planning (WDUA-UP). Based on a systematic review of the WDUA policy's development, this study evaluated the WDUA policy from the perspectives of policy text and implementation effectiveness using text-mining and statistical analysis methods. The results show that the WDUA policy is generally successful and has progressed across all regions in China. Despite existing regional gaps, effectiveness will continue to grow at the current situation of implementation. This study broadens the field of inquiry into China's water policy, enhances the method for assessing global water policy, and offers a fresh viewpoint for the international water community to understand China's integrated water resources management and water governance. HIGHLIGHTS The water-draw and utilization assessment policy, including project construction and urban planning, is a critical policy in China's integrated water resources management.; The text-mining and statistical analysis methods have been used to systematically assess the WDUA policy in China.; The WDUA policy is generally successful and has been formulated scientifically and its implementation has been effective.;