Priority General Authorisations in rights-based water use authorisation in South Africa
This article unravels the notions of justice in statutory water law in Sub-Saharan Africa in general and South Africa in particular. These laws, which allocate and regulate water resources, are licence (or permit) systems. Three forms of injustices are identified for small-scale water users who typi...
| Main Authors: | , |
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| Format: | Journal Article |
| Language: | Inglés |
| Published: |
IWA Publishing
2014
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://hdl.handle.net/10568/58449 |
| _version_ | 1855531636231241728 |
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| author | van Koppen, Barbara Schreiner, B. |
| author_browse | Schreiner, B. van Koppen, Barbara |
| author_facet | van Koppen, Barbara Schreiner, B. |
| author_sort | van Koppen, Barbara |
| collection | Repository of Agricultural Research Outputs (CGSpace) |
| description | This article unravels the notions of justice in statutory water law in Sub-Saharan Africa in general and South Africa in particular. These laws, which allocate and regulate water resources, are licence (or permit) systems. Three forms of injustices are identified for small-scale water users who typically encompass all poor water users: the reinforcement of the historical injustices by which colonial powers captured ownership of water resources and undermined customary water law; administrative discrimination as a result of governments’ lack of capacity to license the large numbers of small-scale users; and discrimination of the smallest-scale users whose exemption from the obligation to apply for a licence relegates them to a second-class entitlement to water. Based on the texts and implementation experiences of the National Water Act (1998) and the pro-poor prioritisation rules in the National Water Resource Strategy-2 (2013), the authors propose the transformative legal tool of priority General Authorisations for black small-scale users to overcome these injustices. Via this tool all black small-scale users, including the poor, would obtain equal access to minimum quantities of water needed to progressively achieve constitutional rights to water, food, and non-discrimination, while the remaining water resources would be allocated to high-impact users through licences with strict and enforceable conditions. |
| format | Journal Article |
| id | CGSpace58449 |
| institution | CGIAR Consortium |
| language | Inglés |
| publishDate | 2014 |
| publishDateRange | 2014 |
| publishDateSort | 2014 |
| publisher | IWA Publishing |
| publisherStr | IWA Publishing |
| record_format | dspace |
| spelling | CGSpace584492025-06-17T08:23:57Z Priority General Authorisations in rights-based water use authorisation in South Africa van Koppen, Barbara Schreiner, B. gender water use water resources water law water governance authority licences poverty smallholders This article unravels the notions of justice in statutory water law in Sub-Saharan Africa in general and South Africa in particular. These laws, which allocate and regulate water resources, are licence (or permit) systems. Three forms of injustices are identified for small-scale water users who typically encompass all poor water users: the reinforcement of the historical injustices by which colonial powers captured ownership of water resources and undermined customary water law; administrative discrimination as a result of governments’ lack of capacity to license the large numbers of small-scale users; and discrimination of the smallest-scale users whose exemption from the obligation to apply for a licence relegates them to a second-class entitlement to water. Based on the texts and implementation experiences of the National Water Act (1998) and the pro-poor prioritisation rules in the National Water Resource Strategy-2 (2013), the authors propose the transformative legal tool of priority General Authorisations for black small-scale users to overcome these injustices. Via this tool all black small-scale users, including the poor, would obtain equal access to minimum quantities of water needed to progressively achieve constitutional rights to water, food, and non-discrimination, while the remaining water resources would be allocated to high-impact users through licences with strict and enforceable conditions. 2014-11-01 2015-03-17T14:40:00Z 2015-03-17T14:40:00Z Journal Article https://hdl.handle.net/10568/58449 en Limited Access IWA Publishing van Koppen, Barbara; Schreiner, B. 2014. Priority General Authorisations in rights-based water use authorisation in South Africa. Water Policy, 16:59-77. doi: https://doi.org/10.2166/wp.2014.110 |
| spellingShingle | gender water use water resources water law water governance authority licences poverty smallholders van Koppen, Barbara Schreiner, B. Priority General Authorisations in rights-based water use authorisation in South Africa |
| title | Priority General Authorisations in rights-based water use authorisation in South Africa |
| title_full | Priority General Authorisations in rights-based water use authorisation in South Africa |
| title_fullStr | Priority General Authorisations in rights-based water use authorisation in South Africa |
| title_full_unstemmed | Priority General Authorisations in rights-based water use authorisation in South Africa |
| title_short | Priority General Authorisations in rights-based water use authorisation in South Africa |
| title_sort | priority general authorisations in rights based water use authorisation in south africa |
| topic | gender water use water resources water law water governance authority licences poverty smallholders |
| url | https://hdl.handle.net/10568/58449 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT vankoppenbarbara prioritygeneralauthorisationsinrightsbasedwateruseauthorisationinsouthafrica AT schreinerb prioritygeneralauthorisationsinrightsbasedwateruseauthorisationinsouthafrica |