The Evolution and Performance of Groundwater Management Institutions in Southern California

12 pages

The Evolution and Performance of Groundwater Management Institutions in Southern California

12 pages

Institutional and policy analysis of river basin management: the Warta River Basin, Poland

The authors describe and analyze the emergence of river basin management in the Warta River Basin of Poland. The Warta basin's 55,193 km2 cover approximately one-sixth of Poland, and the Warta is a principal tributary to the Oder. Water management issues include pollution of the Warta and its main tributaries, prompting cities to rely on groundwater supplies that are beginning to show signs of overdraft, and growing problems of water allocation and scarcity as the basin urbanizes and industrializes. Since the end of the 1980s, the Polish government has been promoting decentralization, constructing a federal system that includes provinces, counties, and municipalities with authority over land use, water use permits, and environmental protection. Polish authorities have also established river basin management authorities corresponding to basin boundaries throughout the nation, including one for the Warta basin. The efforts toward decentralization and integrated water resource management in Poland have been earnest, but the dispersion of water policy authority across several levels of government, the establishment of basin authorities lacking power and funding to implement resource management programs, few arrangements for stakeholder participation, and delays in Polish water law reform have complicated the development and implementation of integrated management at the basin level.Hydrology,Water Conservation,Water Resources Law,Water and Industry,Sanitation and Sewerage,Water Supply and Sanitation Governance and Institutions,Water and Industry,Town Water Supply and Sanitation,Water Conservation,Drought Management

Comparison of institutional arrangements for river basin management in eight basins

This study represents an effort toward understanding conditions that affect successful or unsuccessful efforts to devolve water resource management to the river basin level and secure active stakeholder involvement. A theoretical framework is used to identify potentially important variables related to the likelihood of success. Using a comparative case-study approach, the study examined river basins where organizations have been developed at the basin scale and where organizations perform management functions such as planning, allocation, and pricing of water supplies, flood prevention and response, and water quality monitoring and improvement. This paper compares the alternative approaches to basin governance and management adopted in the following river basins: the Alto-Tiete and Jaguaribe River Basins, Brazil; the Brantas River Basin, East Java, Indonesia; the Fraser River Basin, British Columbia, Canada; the Guadalquivir Basin, Spain; the Murray-Darling River Basin, Australia; the Tarcoles River Basin, Costa Rica; and the Warta River Basin, Poland. The analysis focuses on how management has been organized and pursued in each case in light of its specific geographical, historical, and organizational contexts and the evolution of institutional arrangements. The cases are also compared and assessed for their observed degrees of success in achieving improved stakeholder participation and integrated water resources management.Agricultural Knowledge&Information Systems,Water Supply and Sanitation Governance and Institutions,Town Water Supply and Sanitation,National Governance,Drought Management

Institutional and policy analysis of river basin management: the Fraser River Basin, Canada

The authors describe and analyze a nongovernmental, multi-stakeholder, consensus-based approach to river basin management in the Fraser River basin in Canada. The Fraser River drains 238,000 km2 of British Columbia, supporting nearly 3 million residents and a diverse economy. Water management issues include water quality and allocation, flood protection, and emerging scarcity concerns in portions of the basin. The Fraser Basin Council (FBC) is a locally-initiated nongovernmental organization (NGO) with representation from public and private stakeholders. Since evolving in the 1990s from earlier programs and projects in the basin, FBC has pursued several objectives related to a broad concept of basin"sustainability"incorporating social, economic, and environmental aspects. The NGO approach has allowed FBC to match the boundaries of the entire basin, avoid some intergovernmental turf battles, and involve First Nations communities and private stakeholders in ways governmental approaches sometimes find difficult. While its NGO status means that FBC cannot implement many of the plans it agrees on and must constantly work to maintain diverse yet stable funding, FBC holds substantial esteem among basin stakeholders for its reputation for objectivity, its utility as an information sharing forum, and its success in fostering an awareness of interdependency within the basin.Agricultural Knowledge&Information Systems,Water Conservation,Environmental Economics&Policies,Water and Industry,Sanitation and Sewerage,Water Supply and Sanitation Governance and Institutions,Drought Management,Town Water Supply and Sanitation,Water and Industry,Water Conservation

Institutional and policy analysis of river basin management: the Murray Darling River Basin, Austrialia

The authors describe and analyze management in the Murray-Darling basin of Australia, long regarded as a model for integrated river basin management. This interior basin of over 1 million km2 in semi-arid southeastern Australia is defined by the catchment areas of the Murray and Darling Rivers and their tributaries. Water management issues include allocation, quality, and dryland salinity. Because of Australia's federal governmental structure, institutional development has been more a matter of integrating state and local endeavors than decentralization of national authority. The Australian national government has little constitutional power over water resources. The five states in the basin make policy regarding water rights, discharge permits, fees, and the construction and operation of physical structures. River management began on the Murray River in the 1920s under the terms of a tri-state agreement. As the scope of management widened to the entire basin, more states were added and the national government supported the creation of new arrangements for integrated water resource management, with some provision for stakeholder participation. The dynamics of state-national authority over water policy, and the emergence in recent years of numerous local-level catchment organization, contribute to some uncertainty about the future course of basin management in this internationally renowned site.Water and Industry,Water Conservation,Water Resources Law,Environmental Economics&Policies,Water Supply and Systems,Town Water Supply and Sanitation,Drought Management,Water and Industry,Water Conservation,Water Supply and Sanitation Governance and Institutions

Institutional and policy analysis of river basin management: the tarcoles river basin, Costa Rica

This paper describes and analyzes the effort to institute river basin management in the Tárcoles basin of Costa Rica. Located in west-central Costa Rica, the Tárcoles basin represents 4.2 percent of the nation's total land area, but is home to half the nation's population and the metropolitan area of San José, the nation's capital and largest city. Water management issues include severe water pollution resulting from sewage, industrial waste discharges, agricultural runoff, and deforestation. In the early 1990s a locally-initiated effort established a river basin commission for the Río Grande de Tárcoles (CRGT), which was supported by the central government's environment ministry. Since the late 1990s, however, the DRGT has struggled through changes of leadership, inconsistent support from the central government, and waning participation from basin stakeholders. Despite several programs to arrest deforestation and encourage better industrial and agricultural practices, the basin's water problems continue largely unabated. The Tárcoles case is instructive about both the possibilities and the fragility of efforts to establish integrated water resource management at the river basin level.Water Conservation,Water Supply and Sanitation Governance and Institutions,Town Water Supply and Sanitation,Water and Industry,Drought Management

The Process and Performance of Decentralization of River Basin Resource Management: A Global Analysis

This paper focuses on empirically assessing determinants of river basin management decentralization, which is poorly understood while growing in popularity world wide. Measuring decentralization as a shift of decision making responsibility to water users or governments at the river basin level or below, the analysis sheds light on the decentralization reform process and its success, using primary data from 83 river basins world wide. Contrary to common perception water scarcity is found to be a stimulus to reform and financially endowed or developed basins do not outperform poor an underdeveloped basins; conditions improving decentralization performance include: existence of dispute resolution mechanisms; greater financial responsibility of users; and external government financial support of basin budget.Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

Decentralization of river basin management : a global analysis

Decentralization and increased stakeholder involvement have been major elements of water sector reform as ways to promote sustainable and integrated resource management particularly of river basins. Based on an analytical framework for relating decentralization and stakeholder involvement to improved river basin management, this paper infers several hypotheses about factors associated with greater or lesser likelihood of success of the decentralization process using data from 83 river basins worldwide. The results suggest that physical, political, economic, financial, and institutional characteristics of the basin do affect the process and the level of performance of the decentralization. In particular, the presence of water scarcity may be a stimulus to reform, uniting the stakeholders in the basin and leading to better performance; organized user groups push for the initiation of decentralization reforms but may be associated with costs to the process and difficulty of achieving decentralization; the existence of dispute resolution mechanisms supports stakeholder involvement and improves decentralization performance; where stakeholders accepted greater financial responsibility, complying with tariffs and contributing to the budget for basin management, the decentralization process and performance measures increased; basins with higher percentages of their budgets from external governmental sources benefited from better stability and support and it shows in the performance of the decentralization process.Water Supply and Sanitation Governance and Institutions,National Governance,Town Water Supply and Sanitation,Drought Management,Agricultural Knowledge&Information Systems

Affective Symmetry: Affect and Networks in Blizzard’s StarCraft II: Legacy of the Void

This paper employs a social network analysis of StarCraft II: Legacy of the Void to examine how the single-player campaign structures a largely non-player character (NPC) community. This analysis, which includes a convergence of social network analysis and affect theory, explores the dynamic interactive gameplay network experience of Legacy of the Void. Additionally, the data visualizations map the complex network of communal interactions that exist even in the single player campaign through the virtual community of NPCs into which a player immerses him or herself