Mediating water governance: point‐of‐use water filtration devices for low‐income communities along the US–Mexico border

Abstract

Small‐scale decentralised facilities and household‐level water purification technologies (HWTs) have become unconventional modes of delivering potable water. This paper examines how HWTs transformed from a temporary solution to unsanitary drinking water conditions in the global South to a legitimised technological fix for communities that experience chronic household water insecurity in the United States. We examine the discursive and material processes through which HWTs are applied in periurban and rural subdivisions on the Texas–Mexico border, called colonias. HWTs, through the intervention of social entrepreneurs, experts, and the state, mediate water governance by rearticulating the individual solution and foreclosing a collective or political process to improve community water systems for colonia residents.