This study challenges the prevailing institutional approach to water users associations (WUAs) in China by examining diverse organizational modalities of irrigation management in GC town in the southern part of Shandong province. GC town is a lead grain-producing township that grows wheat and rice across seasons with conjunctive use of surface water and groundwater. The surge of well irrigation, driven by agricultural mechanization, state-backed projects and climate change, has diminished its collective action on irrigation commons. Contrary to top-down institutional planning, this study reveals three distinct models of grassroots irrigation management in three villages, respectively: bureaucratic, self-governing and self-dependent. In YHM village, the ownership and management of government-funded electromechanical wells were converted from the WUAs to the Water Station office under political imperatives. This bureaucratic approach, prevalent in the township, relies on government staff for water fee collection and infrastructure maintenance. XF village, with insufficient surface water in the downstream, has independently built private wells that are managed by local plumbers for the convenience of mechanized irrigation, demonstrating a self-governing model. MW village, without government support, exhibits a self-dependent model, where villagers use various strategies to navigate water access in a less organized way, including private tubewell construction and pump irrigation using their diesel engines. The findings challenge neo-institutional policy prescriptions on cooperation alien from rural society, revealing a complex interplay of traditional and modern, formal and informal, and governmental and folk practices that sustain agricultural production and irrigation management. This context-sensitive analysis underscores the importance of understanding local dynamics in grassroots irrigation management in rural China.
Rural and urban water conservation research in India
Most water conservation research in India continues to focus on rural practices, notwithstanding the rapid pace of urbanisation. We thus proceed from rural conservation practices to those connected with urban development.
Watershed conservation. Rural water conservation programmes are linked in part with forest and pastoral land management and associated fields of applied vegetation and soil science. Search results reflected the fact that watershed management has been a key topic in water conservation research for decades (Farrington and Turton, 2000). Although largely rural, its emphasis on governance could link it with analogous movements in urban and regional planning, as has occurred in the U.S.
Irrigation and drainage have been primarily associated with agricultural water conservation in South Asia. The Indian committee of the International Commission on Irrigation and Drainage (ICID) cites few urban projects in their website and publications. Even progressive irrigation initiatives, e.g. participatory irrigation management, are conceived as rural development programmes, the drip irrigation sector, led by organisations such as the Irrigation Association of India and multinational irrigation companies. At the same time, India has been the locus of innovative social research on irrigation systems in recent decades under the auspices of organisations such as the International Water Management Institute (IWMI), which has researched the links between irrigation research and reuse of treated municipal wastewater (e.g. Celio et al., 2009).
Connections between rural and urban water harvesting systems were curated in the Centre for Science and Environmentʼs Dying Wisdom: The Rise, Fall and Potential of Indiaʼs Traditional Water Harvesting Systems. A follow-up volume on Making Water Everybodyʼs Business was explicitly structured into urban and rural case studies (it also includes some international examples though not formal comparisons across case studies, or North American cases). These movements have had policy adoption at the urban (e.g. Chennai) and state levels (e.g. Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh). Productive scientific debates have focused on the performance and potential of water harvesting at different scales of water planning.
Odisha, a fast-urbanizing coastal state in India faces significant challenges to protect its water resources from water pollution emanating from its 115 cities and towns. As of 2017, nineteen river stretches were highly polluted and centralized sewage management was seen as not suitable in all urban areas due to technical, social and governance reasons. Drinking water scarcity was looming large with its vulnerability to natural disasters like cyclones, and long dry spells of hot weather each year. These issues, exacerbated by climate change, impacted marginalized communities.
The escalating crisis necessitated swift government intervention, paired with efforts to foster citizen responsibility for resource conservation. The sanitation policy was re-written in 2017 and focus was driven towards a multi-dimensional, inclusive approach involving community managed decentralized solutions for wastewater management.
In order to enhance climate resilience, three-pronged principles were adopted: people-centric initiatives, nature-driven approaches, and the development of resilient and inclusive economies. Odisha introduced an innovative wastewater treatment system of separate black and grey-water treatment that is environmentally sustainable and energy-efficient. The decentralized, customized, community-driven model recycles treated water, reducing freshwater shortages and environmental risks. Powered by solar energy, this system avoids chemicals and promotes zero discharge.
Odisha's efforts have a strong focus on empowering marginalized groups like women and transgender self-help groups (SHGs) and slum dwellers associations (SDAs). 1500 SDAs have been associated as implementing partners creating employment opportunities and improving livelihoods. 113 SHGs groups were trained and engaged for operation of the faecal sludge treatment plants. Over 7.3 million urban inhabitants including one third living in informal settlements have benefited from these interventions. As of 2023, twelve polluted river stretches were delisted due to improvement in river health. Grey-water management with nature-based systems is on-going. This approach resulted in reducing pressure on freshwater and advancing climate resilience.
Odisha (an eastern Indian state) prioritizes water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) for all. Besides creating adequate infrastructure, Odisha is ensuring the last mile service delivery through a decentralized community -led WASH management in the cities. This instills community stewardship while leveraging the local resources and skills.
Around 23% of Odisha’s urban families (1.56 m people) live in slums (Census, 2011), are engaged in informal daily wage job like sanitation work, rag picking, construction labor, etc. With low levels of education and skills, they struggle accessing opportunities in urban areas. Absence of identity and address papers deprive them of state’s social security benefits.
India’s 74th Constitutional Amendment Act, 1992, and National Urban Livelihood Mission, 2013 mandate the Urban Local Bodies to address vulnerabilities of urban poor through grassroots institution building, skilling and engaging them in livelihoods.
Odisha has engaged a woman cadre called Jalasathis (Water-Friends) in 2019, who are WSHG members, for managing public awareness, water tax collection, and resolving on-the-ground issues of water supply. Similarly, based on the DAY-NULM and SBM Convergence Guidelines, 2018, Odisha has pioneered the decentralised community partnership model in Solid Waste Management (SWM).
More than 5000 women members from sanitation worker, waste picker and trans-women SHGs are spearheading the SWM value chain – ensuring citizen’s behaviour change, collection and processing of segregated waste.
Odisha has established a training - learning ecosystem with tech-support from Urban Management Centre, a not-for-profit. WSHG friendly modules on their roles and responsibilities, digital literacy, financial literacy, communication skills have been developed and they have been trained.
Overall, 6000 plus WSHG members are managing WASH in Odisha. These women earn a decent income of 15000 INR per month and can access social security entitlements. Women’s status has increased within family and the community; they have gained voice and agency besides their economic empowerment.
The Chambal badlands (comprising of gullies and ravines) are an extensive and striking topography, characterised by a rugged yet spectacular landscape, but with poor soil, lack of vegetation and dreaded dacoits that hid in the gullies and ravines, and where human survival is at stake.
Over the past three decades hundreds of dacoits gave up their life of crime and took to farming. This farming gave them a life of dignity, and they can now meet their needs and aspirations. Change is the villages is evident with each cropping season.
Many dacoits took to crime because farming was impossible due to water scarcity. With no other livelihood opportunities available, and no food on the table, they took to violence to feed their families.
The change from a violent to a non-violent way of life was possible due to their community-led rainwater conservation efforts, which recharged the groundwater, improved soil moisture, vegetation health, and healed the earth. Over the years, water conservation efforts led to a revival of small rivers, indicating a balance between groundwater and surface water. Villagers are now climate resilient. This dramatic change has been possible due to the sustained community facilitation efforts of a civil society organisation.
This work, spread across two districts and several small river basins demonstrates the impact of small, low-cost water conservations structures, constructed at appropriate sites, keeping in mind the local topography and the requirements of the villagers.
This paper will describe the environmental, social and economic benefits that accrued and the role of local knowledge and wisdom in finding equitable solutions for water security, which led to villagers living in dignity, peace and security. It will also describe the importance of sharing knowledge for building conviction and the importance of water security in improving GDP through green growth.
The field of Urban political ecology has often focused on the fragmented waterscapes in cities of the global South, underscoring how unequal water access affects diverse population groups. While previous studies have extensively explored the 'other' urban waters, such as ponds, lakes, and tanker-sourced water, along with their associated power dynamics, this paper introduces urban springs—or baolis—into the discourse. These springs are a vital yet underexplored element of the Himalayan urban waterscape, particularly in mountain cities like Shimla, India, where they provide critical water support during water crises. Despite inadequate maintenance, urban springs remain a primary water source for many residents in the city. This also highlights the resilience of these traditional water systems even as they fall outside the formal governance and infrastructure frameworks.
In this context, this study explores Shimla's springs-scape with an urban political ecology lens to understand how these springs function as both a resource and social space, shaped by complex governance structures and everyday power relations. Focusing on two spring-dependent neighbourhoods, this research employs in-depth interviews, transect walks, oral histories, and spatial mapping to reveal the dynamics surrounding urban springs and the ways in which they contribute to a unique, pluralistic urban political ecology within the context of a mountain city.
Keywords: urban political ecology, mountain springs, governance, power.
There is insufficient support for archival systems sufficient to help historical understanding of environmental quality and relationship with human society, as well as local governance mechanisms to make this work socially for future choices. To improve such a situation as much as possible, how can we reflect our knowledge of our past relationship with water and its use as a resource? This presentation targets the case of the Okinawa Islands, where wells and springs are still treated as sacred even today when they are no longer used.
In this presentation, I focus on both the ways in which watering places continue to exist in the community and the ways in which they are shared based on the knowledge of past experiences related to watering places. First, I clarify the process of citizens' activities to visit and record watering places and the motivation behind the archive concept. Second, the process of materializing the archive concept will be clarified, and how the purpose and content of the activities can be reflected in the development of information tools, which supports the collaborative use of archival knowledge about watering places while visualizing the linkage of knowledge using a knowledge graph, will be shown.
The increasing frequency of both natural and manmade disasters globally has amplified their impact on vulnerable populations, especially marginalized communities and further on women. These disasters—ranging from floods and droughts to wars and communal violence—disproportionately affect women, exacerbating the physical, psychological, social, and political marginalization. The study investigates the critical and often unrecognized ‘water anxiety’ defined as, the mental stress stemming from uncertainty regarding access to water and sanitation during and after disasters. The disasters causing physical displacements intensify the physical, psychological, social, and gender challenges, placing a heavier burden on women. The study aimed to examine the relationships between disasters led displacement with provisioning of water security, and further between the women's anxiety and their resilience in managing water uncertainty and scarcity. The study is part of a project that plans to facilitate water security by bridging the affected communities and the donor organizations. The objective of the paper is to highlight the pattern of water anxiety from the findings and learning from case studies namely, recurring hurricane in Acapulco, Mexico; recurring GLOF (glacier lake outburst flood) affected Kalimpong, India; recurring earthquake in Lamjung District, Nepal; 2023 communal violence in Kakching, India; and 2024 landslides in Wayanad District, India. The approach to study includes ethnographic surveys, qualitative and quantitative tools. Collaborating with local partners—particularly women—and partnering with local NGOs and government entities play a pivotal role in implementing initiatives to understand water anxiety to incorporate them in the water security. The key takeaway from the study is that water anxiety needs factoring in the water security policies and funding to be able to address the water apathy of the disaster affected communities. Besides, the community resilience building among the vulnerable women is worth documenting and dissemination learning.
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