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The benefit-sharing principle : implementing sovereignty bargains on water
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Alam, Undala, Dione, Ousmane and Jeffrey, Paul (2009) The benefit-sharing principle : implementing sovereignty bargains on water. Political Geography, Vol.28 (No. 2). pp. 90-100. doi:10.1016/j.polgeo.2008.12.006 ISSN 0962-6298.
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Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.polgeo.2008.12.006
Abstract
A global water crisis is emerging that may challenge states’ existing and future water availability. With
countries already heavily reliant on international rivers, the issue of managing water scarcity in these
basins is mounting. An already complex issue due to climatic change and the politics of access, the
management of water resources is complicated further by sovereignty. In a context shaped by political
boundaries and a concomitant territorial exclusivity, nation-states seek to guarantee their societies’
water by exerting control through physical and institutional infrastructure. Yet, the basin’s hydrological
interdependency implies co-riparian countries remain vulnerable to each other’s use of the shared river,
suggesting ecological rather than just political limits to sovereignty. The continued vulnerability, as
envisaged within the greening of sovereignty, suggests international cooperation is necessary. Explained
as sovereignty bargains, in which states trade reduced autonomy for future benefits, international
cooperation is, we suggest, bi-directional and can stem from or create international institutions. We
examine an instance of international cooperation that exemplifies an alternative approach to international
river management. The benefit-sharing principle focuses on allocating the outputs from water use,
rather than the water itself; and was used by the Senegal basin riparians to access key services such as
electricity despite a context of poverty, climatic change and intra-basin politics. What emerges is a strong
narrative of cooperation sustained, over decades, by the states’ willingness to engage in sovereignty
bargains.
| Item Type: | Journal Article | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Subjects: | G Geography. Anthropology. Recreation > G Geography (General) G Geography. Anthropology. Recreation > GF Human ecology. Anthropogeography J Political Science > JQ Political institutions (Asia, Africa, Australia, Pacific Area, etc.) |
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| Divisions: | Faculty of Social Sciences > Politics and International Studies | ||||
| Journal or Publication Title: | Political Geography | ||||
| Publisher: | Elsevier Science Inc. | ||||
| ISSN: | 0962-6298 | ||||
| Official Date: | 2009 | ||||
| Dates: |
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| Volume: | Vol.28 | ||||
| Number: | No. 2 | ||||
| Page Range: | pp. 90-100 | ||||
| DOI: | 10.1016/j.polgeo.2008.12.006 | ||||
| Status: | Peer Reviewed | ||||
| Publication Status: | Published | ||||
| Access rights to Published version: | Restricted or Subscription Access |
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