Water Security in Transboundary Systems: Cooperation in Intractable Conflicts and the Nile System
Publisher: Anthem Press
Author(s): Jenny R. Kehl
Date: 2017
Topics: Climate Change, Cooperation, Governance, Renewable Resources
Countries: Egypt, Ethiopia, Kenya, South Sudan, Sudan, Uganda
Transboundary water- governance systems are emerging to negotiate watersharing policies to promote security, stability and sustainability. Yet transboundary water disputes occur within most major shared water systems, and weak riparians are often coerced to agree to water- sharing policies that adversely affect them. This chapter examines strategies to promote cooperation in seemingly intractable water conflicts. For example, the chapter analyzes power asymmetry and the complex relations between strong and weak riparians in the Nile River system, in which water stress perennially tests the commitment to cooperation. The larger quantitative analysis examines the strategies weak riparians use to assert leverage in the international river basin, and the success of those strategies in achieving cooperation versus conflict.