Water law and governance in post‐conflict settings

• Author: Erika Weinthal,Carl Bruch,Jessica Troell
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/reel.12319
• Date: 01 April 2020
• Published date: 01 April 2020

RECIEL. 2020;29:7–20.  

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  7wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/reel

1 | INTRODUCTION

In the aftermat h of conflict, managing water is cri tical, as access to

water and sanit ation is necessary f or meeting basic human n eeds,

restoring livelihoods, ensuring food security, rebuilding the economy

and promoting reconciliation.1 Populations in conflict-affected coun-

tries often la ck access to clean water and prop er sanitation; war not

only harms civi lians through direct a ttacks on populat ion centres,

but also indirec tly by destroying th e critical infrast ructure necessa ry

to support hum an wellbeing, such as water treat ment facilities, irri-

gation system s, and sewage treatment plant s and through contami-

nating water ecosystems.2

Shifting ra infall patterns, dro ughts and floods have m ade man-

aging water even mor e difficult in the t wenty-first centur y; and

changing water ava ilability has been lin ked to internal conflict i n

many parts of t he world.3 For example, water sc arcity and drought

were some of the many f actors contributing to th e outbreak of the

Syrian civil war.4 For count ries emerging from de cades of conflict ,

extreme var iability in water flows can af fect their ability to reb uild;

unprecedente d heavy rains in Iraq in March 2019, for example , led

to flooding alon g the Tigris River, displace ment of peoples in severa l

governates and ca used several water trea tment plants to stop

functioning.5

In post-conflict se ttings, there are nu merous risks to peacebu ild-

ing if water is not prio ritized. Yet, restoring a ccess to water is not just

about rebuilding infrastructure and introducing new technologies;

rather, scholarship on water and post-conflict peacebuilding has

shown that water c an be leveraged in differ ent ways for peacebuild-

ing – that is, for hum anitarian recover y, rebuilding livelihoods ,

1 E Weinthal, J Troell a nd M Nakayama (eds) , Water and Post-conflict Peacebuilding

(Routledge 2 014).

2 J Sowers, E Weint hal and N Zawahr i, ‘Targeting Envir onmental Infr astructu res:

Internatio nal Law and Infr astructur al Wars in the Midd le East and Nor th Africa’ (2017)

48 Securit y Dialogue 410.

3 CS Hendrix a nd I Salehyan, ‘C limate Change, R ainfall, and S ocial Conflic t in Africa’

(2012) 49 Journa l of Peace Researc h 35.

4 T Friedman, ‘ Without Water, Revo lution’ (New York Tim es, 18 May 2013); CNA Mi litary

Advisory B oard, ‘Natio nal Security a nd the Acceler ating Risks of Cli mate Change’ (Cen ter

for Naval Anal ysis Corpora tion 2014). For a criti cal perspec tive, see J Selby, OS D ahi, C

Froehlich an d M Hulme, ‘Climat e Change and the Syr ian Civil War Revis ited’ (2017) 60

Political G eography 232.

5 Reliefweb, ‘ Iraq: Floods – M arch 2019’ fweb.int/disas ter/

fl-2019-000030-irq>.

DOI: 10 .1111/reel .12319

SPECIAL ISSUE ARTICLE

Water law and governance in post-conflict settings

Carl Bruch  | Erika Weinthal  | Jessica Troell

© 2020 John Wiley & Sons Ltd, 9600 Gar sington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Ma in Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA .

Correspondence

Email: bruch @eli.org In the aftermath of conf lict, managing water is critical , as access to water and sanita-

tion is necessar y for meeting basic human needs, re storing livelihoods, ensurin g food

security, rebuilding t he economy and promoting recon ciliation. This article ar gues

that governance is critic al for meeting the challenges i n the water sector in post-

conflict settin gs, not just for restoring live lihoods and basic human wellbein g, but also

for supporting sustainable development and addressing emerging challenges such as

the increasing preva lence of droughts and floods that threate n to erase many of the

peace dividends that water may provide at war’s end. This article examines water and

water law through the len s of State fragility, conflict and governance to she d light on

the importa nce of building resilient and flexi ble water governance institutio ns that

can withstan d what is often a precarious pea cebuilding process in which conflic t may

continue even after a peace agreement is reached.