Posts

Changing conceptions of rights to water

What do we really mean when we talk about a right to water? A human right to water is a cornerstone of a democratic society, but what form that right should take is hotly debated.

irrigationArticle by Bettina Lange and Mark Shepheard, from the Oxford University Press blog

Recently 1,884,790 European Union (EU) citizens have signed a petition that asks the EU institutions to pass legislation which recognizes a human right to water, and which declares water to be a public good not a commodity.

But a right to water has various facets. It includes rights of economic operators, such as power stations and farmers to abstract water from rivers, lakes, and groundwater sources. The conundrum here is that an individual human right to water, including a right to drinking water and sanitation, can be in conflict with the rights of economic operators to water. More importantly such human rights to water may be in conflict with a right to water of the environment itself. The natural environment needs water to sustain important features such as habitats that support a wide range of animals and plants.

There is a growing trend under the label of ‘environmental stewardship’ that prompts us to think not in terms of trade-offs between different claims to water, but to change how we think about what a right to water entails. Environmental stewardship means that human uses of water – by individual citizens, consumers and economic operators – should pay greater attention to the needs of the natural environment itself for water. This raises some thorny issues that go to the heart of how we think about fundamental rights in contemporary democracies. Should we abolish the possibility to own natural sources, such as water and thus limit the scope of private property rights? Should we develop ideas of collective property, which involves state ownership of natural resources exercised on behalf of citizens? Should we simply qualify existing private property and administrative rights to water through stewardship practices? It is the latter approach that is currently mainly applied in various countries. How does this work? Water law can impose specific legal duties, for instance on economic operators to use water efficiently, in order to promote stewardship practices. Whether this will be of any consequence, however, depends on what those who are regulated by the legal framework think and do.

A recent study therefore explored how English farmers think about a right to water and its qualification through stewardship practices. The study found that three key factors shape what a right to water means to farmers.

First, the institutional-legal framework that regulates how much water farmers can abstract through licences issued by the Environment Agency defines the scope of a right to water.

Second – and this struck us as particularly interesting – not just the law and the institutions through which water rights are implemented matter, but also how natural space is organized. The characteristics of farms and catchments themselves, in particular whether they facilitated the sharing of water between different users, influenced how farmers thought about a right to water. Water sharing could enable stewardship practices of efficient water use that qualified conventional notions of individual economic rights to water.

Third – and this touches upon key debates about the ‘green economy’ – the economic context in which rights to water are exercised has a bearing on how ideas about rights to water become qualified by environmental stewardship.

In particular ‘green’ production and consumption standards shape how farmers think about a right to water. There are a range of standards that have been developed by the farming industry, independent certification bodies, such as the Soil Association, as well as manufacturers of food stuffs to whom farmers sell their produce and supermarkets. These standards prompt farmers to consider the impact of their water use on the natural environment. For instance, the Red Tractor standard for potatoes asks farmers to think of water use in terms of a strategic plan of environmental management for the farm, which also addresses ‘accurate irrigation scheduling’, ‘the use of soil moisture and water application technology’, as well as ‘regular and even watering’. These are voluntary standards, but they matter. They can render farmers’ practices in relation to water stewardship more transparent and thus also promote accountability for the use of natural resources.

Supermarket standards were considered as most influential by farmers, particularly in water scarce areas of the United Kingdom such as East Anglia. But these standards revealed an interesting tension between their economic and environmental facets.

Somehow paradoxically green consumption and production standards could also reinforce significant water use by farmers, such as spray irrigation in order to achieve good product appearance. For instance, some manufacturers of crisps seek to reduce the impact on water use of the crops they source for their products. But farmers who want to sell their potato crops to crisp manufacturers still have to achieve ‘good skin finish’, because ‘nobody wants scabby potatoes’!

So, next time you go grocery shopping ask how your consumer choice shapes a right to water.

Dr Bettina Lange is an Associate Professor in Law and Regulation at the Centre for Socio-Legal Studies, Oxford University. Her research draws on social theory and qualitative empirical methods in order to understand how political and economic contexts shape how environmental legal rules are interpreted and implemented. Dr Mark Shepheard is a postdoctoral fellow at the School of Law at the University of New England, Australia. His research interests are natural resource stewardship, regulation and governance, virtue ethics as well as land and water management obligations. Together, they are the authors of ‘Changing Conceptions of Rights to Water? An Eco-Socio-Legal Perspective‘, which won the 2014 JEL annual Richard Macrory best article prize and is available to read for free for a limited time in the Journal of Environmental Law.

 

/0 Comments/by

Michael Rouse speaks at international seminar on the future of urban water regulation in Spain

Michael Rouse shared his expertise on water regulation at a seminar organised by the University of Valencia on behalf of the Spanish Government.

On 29-30 April 2014, experts from a number of countries, as well as Spanish government and utility stakeholders gathered at the event ‘The future of urban water regulation in Spain’. The aim was to share experiences and solutions from around the world and analyse the situation in Spain with a view to deciding what form of regulation should be adopted there.

There was international attendance by invitation from UK, Portugal, Australia, Germany, Denmark, Chile and Columbia. Michael Rouse presented the history and experience of UK regulation since 1990, gave his views on its relevance to Spain and highlighted important experience from elsewhere in the world. The attendance from Spain covered all relevant national government departments, regional governments and water and wastewater service providers, involving around 150 people.

/0 Comments/by

Economic Rights and Regulatory Regimes: is there still a ‘right’ to water?

On Tuesday 19 March, a workshop at Oxford University gathered 55 participants from the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), the Environment Agency, the National Farmers’ Union, water companies, along with academic experts to discuss the right to water in the light of increasing regulatory intervention.

 

The event was convened by Dr. Bettina Lange, Centre for Socio-Legal Studies, Oxford University and Dr. Mark Shepheard, McGill University, in association with the Foundation of Law, Justice and Society and Wolfson College.

The workshop’s theme was inspired by increasing concerns about water scarcity issues in the face of pressures from climate change and reforms to the abstraction licensing system currently being discussed for England and Wales.

The first panel, which invited speakers to ‘rethink’ water rights through stewardship, was opened by Professor Karen Morrow from Swansea University who provided an extensive overview of the common law applicable to water regulation. Morrow highlighted the links that water regulation has not only with property law but also with administrative environmental and human rights law. She introduced the new and more radical approach of granting rights to nature to protect water resources. Dr. Bettina Lange and Dr. Mark Shepheard shared their findings from empirical socio-legal research which mapped how farmers think about a right to water and identified key factors that shape such conceptions.

Henry Leveson-Gower, Head of Defra’s Future Water Resource Management Project, opened the second panel which explored the use of market mechanisms for promoting water stewardship. He explained the need for a reform of the current water abstraction licensing system, highlighting that the current system is not flexible enough to respond to alternating floods and droughts due to climate change. Leveson-Gower urged the need for more efficient use of water resources and outlined three economic incentive-based options currently being considered by the government. 

Alice Piure, Strategy & Policy Analyst at Anglian Water, presented interesting findings from a research project that explored the use of various types of water trading and their contribution to promoting water stewardship. Finally, Jon Stern from City University London discussed market-based approaches to dealing with periodic water scarcity, in particular the sale of raw water from one region to another.

The third panel offered academic perspectives on state regulatory approaches to water stewardship. Donald McGillivray of Sussex University gave a historical overview of the approach taken by the common law to regulate water stewardship. He argued that the current regulation gives mixed legal messages about water rights and sustainability as there is no real clarity regarding the regulatory goals.

Prof. Bill Howarth of Kent University pointed to the significant advances that have been made in regulation to anticipate and manage the risks of unpredictable events such as floods or droughts, but argued that much more must be done to effectively enhance ‘water security’.  Dr. Sarah Hendry from Dundee University closed the session with some contrasting insights from Scottish water regulation.

The final panel involved a round-table discussion regarding the future research agenda in water stewardship. Various themes were raised, including the challenge of reconciling potentially different competing regulatory goals, specifically ‘water security’ and ‘food security’, as well as challenges to and opportunities for developing cross-disciplinary perspectives on water stewardship.

By Sebastián Castro, DPhil Student, Centre for Socio-Legal Studies, Faculty of Law, University of Oxford.

View workshop presentations and podcasts

/0 Comments/by

Australian water practitioners visit Oxford to learn from innovations in the UK water industry

Gareth Walker, University of Oxford

On Thursday 10 May, a delegation of 18 Australian water management specialists from industry, local government, and engineering consultancies visited Oxford University as part of a Water Sensitive Studies Tour. Speakers from Oxford University and the UK research and technology sector briefed the delegation on trends in policy, research and technology in the UK water industry.

Dr Dustin Garrick presented Oxford University’s Water Security Network which was launched to establish Oxford as a global centre of water science excellence and innovation. The network’s research themes reflect Oxford’s areas of strength and capacity, with relevance to multiple aspects of urban water management. The network fosters links with external partners across the world. “We are actively building partnerships with Australian researchers, policymakers and practitioners in the areas of climate risk and resilience to promote water security,” said Garrick.

Ian Bernard (British Water) and Gareth Walker (DPhil candidate, Oxford University) highlighted the water scarcity challenges faced by the UK Water Industry, along with current policy and regulatory responses.

The drive for innovation and new technology uptake in the UK water sector was discussed by Steven Lambert (Technology Strategy Board), Derek Pedley and Kerry Thomas (both from Oxford’s Environmental Sustainability Knowledge Transfer Network). Current government initiatives are targeted to overcome the institutional and economic barriers to innovation, while the ESKTN supports coordinated research and knowledge sharing across diverse public and private sector actors.

Discussions included the potential transferability of lessons learnt between the Australia and UK, with a particular focus on utility responses to water scarcity, the impact of regulatory frameworks, and behavioural change in relation to demand management.

The delegates shared several insights about long-term planning under non-stationary conditions. The UK’s experience of a collapse in demand during the economic recession in the 1970s was contrasted with the recent and sudden abatement of drought conditions in regions of Australia. A theme emerged; in the case of investments in projects such as reservoirs and desalination plants, planning horizons can span several decades, yet our ability to forecast climatic conditions and demand trajectories at this time scale are highly uncertain.

How can the political and economic risk of over or under investment be mitigated given these uncertainties?  Innovations in technologies and institutional design were acknowledged to provide potentially more adaptive modes of management. However, the barriers of political will and cultural change remain significant and poorly understood.

 

/0 Comments/by