Rights-based freshwater governance for the twenty-first century: beyond an exclusionary focus on domestic water uses

The UN recognition of a human right to water for drinking, personal and other domestic uses and sanitation in 2010 was a political breakthrough in states’ commitments to adopt a human rights framework in carrying out part of their mandate. This chapter explores other domains of freshwater governance...

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Main Authors: van Koppen, Barbara, Hellum, A., Mehta, L., Derman, B., Schreiner, B.
Format: Book Chapter
Language:Inglés
Published: 2016
Subjects:
Online Access:https://hdl.handle.net/10568/78676
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author van Koppen, Barbara
Hellum, A.
Mehta, L.
Derman, B.
Schreiner, B.
author_browse Derman, B.
Hellum, A.
Mehta, L.
Schreiner, B.
van Koppen, Barbara
author_facet van Koppen, Barbara
Hellum, A.
Mehta, L.
Derman, B.
Schreiner, B.
author_sort van Koppen, Barbara
collection Repository of Agricultural Research Outputs (CGSpace)
description The UN recognition of a human right to water for drinking, personal and other domestic uses and sanitation in 2010 was a political breakthrough in states’ commitments to adopt a human rights framework in carrying out part of their mandate. This chapter explores other domains of freshwater governance in which human rights frameworks provide a robust and widely accepted set of normative values to such governance. The basis is General Comment No. 15 of the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in 2002, which states that water is needed to realise a range of indivisible human rights to non-starvation, food, health, work and an adequate standard of living and also procedural rights to participation and information in water interventions. On that basis, the chapter explores concrete implications of the Comment for states’ broader infrastructure-based water services implied in the recognised need to access to infrastructure, rights to non-discrimination in public service delivery and respect of people’s own prioritisation. This implies a right to water for livelihoods with core minimum service levels for water to homesteads that meet both domestic and small-scale productive uses, so at least 50–100 l per capita per day. Turning to the state’s mandates and authority in allocating water resources, the chapter identifi es three forms of unfair treatment of smallscale users in current licence systems. As illustrated by the case of South Africa, the legal tool of “Priority General Authorisations” is proposed. This prioritises water allocation to small-scale water users while targeting and enforcing regulatory licences to the few high-impact users.
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spelling CGSpace786762024-03-22T10:24:39Z Rights-based freshwater governance for the twenty-first century: beyond an exclusionary focus on domestic water uses van Koppen, Barbara Hellum, A. Mehta, L. Derman, B. Schreiner, B. freshwater water governance domestic water water use water supply water allocation drinking water sanitation human rights multiple use licences food security living standards infrastructure The UN recognition of a human right to water for drinking, personal and other domestic uses and sanitation in 2010 was a political breakthrough in states’ commitments to adopt a human rights framework in carrying out part of their mandate. This chapter explores other domains of freshwater governance in which human rights frameworks provide a robust and widely accepted set of normative values to such governance. The basis is General Comment No. 15 of the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in 2002, which states that water is needed to realise a range of indivisible human rights to non-starvation, food, health, work and an adequate standard of living and also procedural rights to participation and information in water interventions. On that basis, the chapter explores concrete implications of the Comment for states’ broader infrastructure-based water services implied in the recognised need to access to infrastructure, rights to non-discrimination in public service delivery and respect of people’s own prioritisation. This implies a right to water for livelihoods with core minimum service levels for water to homesteads that meet both domestic and small-scale productive uses, so at least 50–100 l per capita per day. Turning to the state’s mandates and authority in allocating water resources, the chapter identifi es three forms of unfair treatment of smallscale users in current licence systems. As illustrated by the case of South Africa, the legal tool of “Priority General Authorisations” is proposed. This prioritises water allocation to small-scale water users while targeting and enforcing regulatory licences to the few high-impact users. 2016 2017-01-11T08:45:09Z 2017-01-11T08:45:09Z Book Chapter https://hdl.handle.net/10568/78676 en Open Access Van Koppen , Barbara; Hellum , A.; Mehta, L.; Derman, B.; Schreiner, B. 2016. Rights-based freshwater governance for the twenty-first century: beyond an exclusionary focus on domestic water uses. In Karar, E. (Ed). Freshwater governance for the 21st century. London, UK: SpringerOpen. pp.129-143.
spellingShingle freshwater
water governance
domestic water
water use
water supply
water allocation
drinking water
sanitation
human rights
multiple use
licences
food security
living standards
infrastructure
van Koppen, Barbara
Hellum, A.
Mehta, L.
Derman, B.
Schreiner, B.
Rights-based freshwater governance for the twenty-first century: beyond an exclusionary focus on domestic water uses
title Rights-based freshwater governance for the twenty-first century: beyond an exclusionary focus on domestic water uses
title_full Rights-based freshwater governance for the twenty-first century: beyond an exclusionary focus on domestic water uses
title_fullStr Rights-based freshwater governance for the twenty-first century: beyond an exclusionary focus on domestic water uses
title_full_unstemmed Rights-based freshwater governance for the twenty-first century: beyond an exclusionary focus on domestic water uses
title_short Rights-based freshwater governance for the twenty-first century: beyond an exclusionary focus on domestic water uses
title_sort rights based freshwater governance for the twenty first century beyond an exclusionary focus on domestic water uses
topic freshwater
water governance
domestic water
water use
water supply
water allocation
drinking water
sanitation
human rights
multiple use
licences
food security
living standards
infrastructure
url https://hdl.handle.net/10568/78676
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