Abstract

AbstractThis chapter sets the context for the analysis of water security in peri-urban South Asia. Urbanization has been a key demographic trend globally as well as in South Asia, in the recent past and increasingly also in the future. While cities are often seen as engines of economic growth and development, and are associated with economies of scale, efficiency and sustainability, much urban growth occurs through the appropriation and reallocation of land and water from their peripheries. This creates patterns of deprivation for resource-dependent peri-urban and rural communities, as well as increasingly severe environmental problems, such as the over-extraction of groundwater and water pollution. This chapter first introduces the various perspectives, themes and cases presented in the book chapters. It then discusses urbanization and the peri-urban more specifically, introducing two contrasting views — ecological modernization and political ecology — and introduces the concept of water security. Referring to the examples from the book, the chapter then gives an overview of some of its key themes: the role of material infrastructure; property transformations and the declining commons; socially differentiated access to water; intervening in the peri-urban; and the role of conflict and cooperation.

Highlights

  • Peri-Urban Water Security in South AsiaVishal Narain and Dik Roth1.1 Setting the SceneThe world is rapidly urbanizing

  • In the prospects for 2018–2030 for these relatively less urbanized regions, the number of cities with 500,000 or more inhabitants is expected to grow by 57 per cent in Africa and by 23 per cent in Asia (United Nations, 2019, p. 11)

  • The same report estimates that “all the expected world population growth during 2018-2050 will be in urban areas”: while the urban population is expected to rise from 4.2 billion to 6.7 billion, Author sequences for Vishal Narain and Dik Roth are alphabetical: both authors have contributed to the writing of this chapter and to the editing process of the book

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Summary

Setting the Scene

Almost half of the urban population currently lives in urban settlements of less than 500,000 inhabitants, rather than in the relatively few mega-cities of the world (United Nations, 2019). In the prospects for 2018–2030 for these relatively less urbanized regions, the number of cities with 500,000 or more inhabitants is expected to grow by 57 per cent in Africa and by 23 per cent in Asia The book adds to a growing body of scholarship on the peri-urban and, on peri-urban water security in South-Asia (for a review, see Narain & Prakash, 2016). Despite a growing body of work on the peri-urban by urban(ization)

Introduction
Selection of Peri-Urban Cases
Various Engagements, Themes and Perspectives
Understanding the Peri-Urban: A Diversity of Frames of Reference and Approaches
Peri-Urban Water Security
The Role of Material Infrastructure
Property Transformations and Declining Commons
Socially Differentiated Access to Water
Intervening in the Peri-Urban
Findings
Conflict and Cooperation
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