Abstract
This editorial is an introduction to the special issue of Resources on New Water Regimes. The special issue explores legal geographies of water resource management with the dual goals of providing critiques of existing water management practices as well as exploring potential alternatives. The papers in the special issue draw from numerous theoretical perspectives, including decolonial and post-anthropocentric approaches to water governance; social and environmental justice in water management; and understanding legal ecologies. A variety of themes of water governance are addressed, including water allocation, groundwater management, collaborative governance, drought planning, and water quality. The papers describe and analyze water issues and new ideas in multiple countries, including Australia, Ecuador, New Zealand, India, and the United States.
Highlights
We critically examine the legal and administrative structures of water control, with the goal of imagining alternatives to entrenched systems of capitalist and anthropocentric water governance
Most of the papers in this special issue illustrate the difficulties of implementing new visions of water governance
They demonstrate the powerful continuity and hegemony of certain legal systems, in the settler-colonial legal systems rooted in European traditions
Summary
We critically examine the legal and administrative structures of water control, with the goal of imagining alternatives to entrenched systems of capitalist and anthropocentric water governance. While concrete water infrastructure projects such as dams are readily recognized as difficult to change, the laws and legal principles that shape water management can represent deep-rooted structures that are just as hard to shift. As successful dam removal projects illustrate, even concrete is not immutable; legal structures can change and evolve. This issue focuses on developing a better understanding of how existing laws and administrative structures shape water management, often in ways that preclude more sustainable and equitable practices, while considering alternatives informed by perspectives such as post-anthropocentrism, decolonialism, and social and environmental justice. A common thread linking water resource management challenges around the world is that these challenges are not just hydrological ones—they are socio-legal in nature as well
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