How 'soft' power shapes transboundary water ... - Global Water Forum

How ‘soft’ power shapes transboundary water interaction

Jeroen Warner*, Mark Zeitoun**, Naho Miramuchi# *Wageningen University, Netherlands, **University of East Anglia, UK #King’s College London, UK

Discussion Paper 1323

June 2013

Predictions of water wars between states are numerous and frequent. To date, no such events have actually eventuated. This article shows that many transboundary basins exhibit a mix of cooperation and conflict that is embodied in a range of nonviolent, co-‐ optative power manifestations collectively known as ‘soft power’. The authors find relations between riparians to be governed by a wide spectrum of power instruments, from side payments and bribery to persuasion and inciting desire to emulating success. The incorporation of ‘soft’ power into the analysis of conflicts in hegemonic contexts provides insight into the choices riparian states (can) make or avoid in their transboundary water interaction; and into how negotiations and treaties can lead towards conflict management but not necessarily to conflict resolution.

and projects; as well as concise overviews and explanations of complex topics. We encourage our readers to engage in discussion with our contributing authors through the GWF website.

Keywords: transboundary, basin, soft power, governance, conflict, cooperation, water wars

With monotonous regularity since the late 1980s NGOs, politicians or think tanks have predicted a water war could erupt any day now. Recently, a UK Minister predicted war in the middle run.1 No such thing has happened, though, and prominent water scholars have argued2,3 a war fought strictly over water is unlikely in the future. That does not mean there is peace and

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harmony

among

co-riparians.

Power

differences and latent conflicts persist, usually under the radar of the basin hegemon but in full view of those who live their effects. The

Suggested Citation: Warner, J., Zeitoun, M., and N. Mirumachi (2013), ‘How ‘soft power shapes transboundary water interaction’, GWF Discussion Paper 1323, Global Water Forum, Canberra, Australia. Available online at: http://www.globalwaterforum.org/2013/06/03/6928/.


state of affairs in many transboundary basins

away from certain agendas and issues, and

can be characterised as a mix of cooperation

towards maintenance of a biased status quo.

and conflict4, with those benefitting from the status quo emphasising the former. Our first article, Transboundary Water Interaction 15, called this the ‘ugly’ side of cooperation.

Nye

was

reiterating

Machiavelli’s

understanding of power as a centaur, half man (arguably rational), half horse (based on strength). He is far more optimistic than

A clue to understanding this situation, we

Machiavelli about human progress towards

argue in its sequel6, is to look at what lies

eternal peace, buttressed by freedom and

beneath: how power is exercised. The ‘water

trade. Fragmented evidence to support this

wars’ discourse has simplistically focused on

hope exists in transboundary water contexts;

the exercise of hard power, predominantly

many treaties never really came off the ground,

violence and coercion. Both philosophical

and

reasoning (Hannah Arendt) and empirically

diplomatic crises over water are not unheard

grounded hydropolitical work7 has shown,

of.9

even

in

highly

integrated

Europe,

however, that rule based on fear and brute power has little hope in the long term. Some

A ‘soft power’ perspective, then, is not yet

kind of legitimacy and consent is needed to

sophisticated

perpetuate Empirically,

any we

to

explain

power

power

relation.

relations between riparians. Our framework of

relations

between

hydro-hegemony10 highlights

unequal find

enough

how

conflict,

riparians to be governed by a wider spectrum

even if it is not open and visible, is structurally

of power instruments, from side payments

present between riparians (and groundwater

and bribery to persuasion and inciting desire

users). In an integrated transboundary water

to emulating success. This wide range of

configuration, interests between dominant

nonviolent, co-optative power manifestations

and

is collectively known as ‘soft power’: getting

distributed power configuration, they are

others to want what you want. Nye8 sought to

fundamentally at odds. Cooperation by the

explain how relations can be peaceful through

non-hegemonic actor, or its compliance to

the power of attraction without the need for a

certain states of affairs, does not necessarily

threat of violence. We find however that ‘soft’

mean consensus. Successful framing by the

power not only contains the positive power of

stronger party as the common good (soft

attraction but also its negative, repellence,

power),

subaltern

are

however,

harmonious;

can

result

in

in

a

power

differences going uncontested and countries


signing treaties that bring highly differential

dam-building to be a casus belli (a legitimate

benefits. Unqualified calls for and claims to

reason to start a war) should it lead to lower

transboundary cooperation ‘of any sort, no

inflow into Egypt.16 It could be argued that

matter how slight’11 are therefore as wrong-

this threat prevented Ethiopia, the Blue Nile

headed as are alarms over water wars. Policy

upstream power, building dams in the past;

and

unqualified

alternatively there is also the material reality

“cooperation” were criticised on the grounds

that the country could hardly fund and realise

that negative forms of cooperation need

its own dam infrastructure. This penury is

reform or resolution, not management or

worsened by the stipulation of key multilateral

encouragement.

funders that they will not fund transboundary

programmes

promoting

projects that lack the endorsement of all The Hydro-hegemony framework is indebted to the Gramscian concept of hegemony as ingrained

in

material

structures pervading social

and

ideational

systems.12,13

negotiations are multi-level power

River

games14

riparian sates. The balance in favour of Egypt has also relied upon the moral and material support of the United States, to which it is one of the biggest allies in the region.

in

which state representatives are the lynchpin.

It’s not all about hard power. After Nasser’s

Representatives of hydro-hegemons can deny

1953 revolution, the nationalisation of the

there being conflict and appear magnanimous,

Suez Canal and the building of the Aswan

while knowing full well the odds are stacked in

Dam, Egypt became a respected Southern

their favour. States frame their water interest

leader.

in non-contestable security terms.15 Whether

condoned several cooperative, technical and

picked up, amplified and given material

political

support, or purposely backgrounded, such

(UNDUGU, TECCONILE, Nile 2002) on the

discursive framing of issues matters.

unstated premise that these bodies would not

The

water

government

fora

on

organised

the

river

or

Nile

tamper with Egypt’s self-ascribed water rights, An example may be helpful here. Egypt has

laid down in treaties agreed with Sudan but

long claimed a veto on any upstream ‘arrest’ of

none of the other Nile riparians in 1929 and

Nile waters for consumptive water use,

1959. The Sadat government’s signing of the

through

reservoirs, distribution

Camp David treaty with Israel anointed the

systems and the like. Underpinned by one of

country as a ‘peacemaker’ in the eyes of

the largest armies in the region, the national

influential superpowers, and the country has

irrigation

government has previously declared upstream


seen prominent nationals (Boutros-Ghali,

overthrow, upstream states had taken the

Abu-Zeid) ascend to leadership positions in

plunge and embarked on a Nile Treaty without

multilateral institutions, bestowing an aura of

Egypt.17 Egypt currently has little realistic

authority and legitimacy in the UN world

alternative to joining the new arena of Nile

order upon Egypt. In everyday interaction,

negotiations and no longer holds defacto veto

upstream states have refrained from taking

power over major upstream projects like the

action

Grand Renaissance Dam.

against

Egypt’s

interest

without

prodding. Examination of this sub-text is important to A recent shift in the Nilotic water-sharing

understand what’s going on in basins around

status quo over the past (half-) decade

the world. Similar analyses are not only

however seems to reflect a shift in the

applicable

hegemonic power balance. Egypt is arguably

Euphrates/Tigris,

not as important to American interests as it

Brahmaputra and Colorado basins, but also to

used to be. Meanwhile China has used its own

seemingly peaceful European transboundary

‘soft power’ through the provision of upstream

streams such as the Rhine and Scheldt.10 The

investment: buying oil in Sudan, supporting

incorporation of ‘soft’ power into the analysis

the giant Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam

of conflicts in hegemonic contexts provides

and investing in land in several Nile states.

insight into the choices riparian states (can)

China’s non-interference in political relations

make or avoid in their transboundary water

and the persuasive example of its own

interaction; and into how negotiations and

economic success raises goodwill. Moreover,

treaties can lead towards conflict management

Egypt’s relative international standing as an

but not necessarily to conflict resolution.

‘example’ has also seen a slide, following

Power dynamics moreover show that no

allegations

of

matter how hegemonic or even dominant a

alienation

from

human

rights

Israel,

violations,

and

failing

megaprojects under Mubarak. Even before his

to

the

familiarly

contentious

Jordan,

Ganges,

state, its hard and soft power are ultimately fluid.

References 1. Harvey, F. (2012), “Water wars between countries could be just around the corner, Davey warns”, The Guardian, 22 March 2012. 2. Wolf, A. (1996) "Middle East Water Conflicts and Directions for Conflict Resolution." Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute (2020 Vision Initiative Monograph #12). 3. Allan, J, A (2001), The Middle East Water Question: Hydro-politics and the Global Economy. London: I.B. Tauris.

How ‘soft’ power shapes transboundary water interaction 4. Mirumachi, N. and Allan, J.A. (2007). Revisiting Transboundary Water Governance: Power, Conflict, Cooperation and the Political Economy. CAIWA conference paper. http://www.newater.uniosnabrueck.de/caiwa/data/papers session/F3/CAIWA-FullPaperMirumachiAllan25Oct07submitted2.pdf 5. Zeitoun, M., Mirunmachi, N. (2008). “Transboundary water interaction I: reconsidering conflict and cooperation”. International Environmental Agreements 8:297–316. 6. Zeitoun, M., Mirumachi, N. & Warner, J. (2011).“Transboundary water interaction II: Soft power underlying conflict and cooperation”. International Environmental Agreements 11:159–178. 7. Dinar, (2009). “Power asymmetry and negotiations in international river basins”. International Negotiation 14(2): 329–360. 8. Nye, J. (1990). Bound to Lead: The Changing Nature of American Power. New York: Basic Books. 9. Warner, J. and van Buuren, M.W, (2009). “Multi-Stakeholder Learning and Fighting on the River Scheldt”. International Negotiation 14(2) p. 419-440. 10. Zeitoun, M. and J. Warner. (2006). “Hydro-Hegemony: A Framework for Analysis of Transboundary Water Conflicts”, Water Policy 8: 435-460. 11. UNDP. (2006). Beyond Scarcity: Power, Poverty and the Global Water Crisis. Human Development Report 2006. New York, USA, United Nations Development Programme. 12. Selby, J. (2005), “Oil and water: the contrasting anatomies of resource conflicts”. Government and Opposition 40 (2): 200-224. 13. Davidson-Harden, A., Naidoo, A. and Harden, A. (2007), “The Geopolitics of the Water Justice Movement”, Peace, Conflict and Development 11 [Online]. http://www.peacestudiesjournal.org.uk/dl/PCD%20Issue%2011_Article_Water%20Justice%2Movement _Davidson%20Naidoo%20Harden.pdf 14. Warner, J. (2008), “Contested hydrohegemony: Hydraulic control and security in Turkey”, Water Alternatives 1(2): 271-288. 15. Buzan, B., Waever, O. and de Wilde, J. (1998), Security. A New Framework for Analysis. London: Harvester Wheatsheaf. 16. Warner, J., Sebastian, A. and V. Empinotti (2012), “Claiming (back) the land: The geopolitics of Egyptian and South African land and water grabs”, in Allan, J. A., Keulertz, M., Warner, J. and S. Sojamo (eds.), Handbook of Land and Water Grabs in Africa. London: Routledge. 17. Nicol, A. and A. Cascao (2011), “Against the flow - new power dynamics and upstream mobilisation in the Nile Basin”, Review of African Political Economy 38(128): 317 – 325.

About the author(s) Dr. Jeroen Warner is Assistant Professor of Disaster Studies at Wageningen University in the Netherlands. He has written extensively on the politics of water. His most recent book is ‘Making space for the river: Governance experiences with multifunctional river flood management in the US and Europe’. Dr. Mark Zeitoun is Reader in Development Studies at the University of East Anglia. His primary research interests lie in the political economy of transboundary environmental governance in ‘development’ contexts. These interests have been cultivated by his role as co-lead in the London Water Research Group and the UEA Water Security Research Centre. Dr. Naho Mirumachi is Lecturer in Geography at the Department of Geography, King’s College London. Trained in political science, international studies and human geography, she has research interests in the politics of natural resources management, particularly water. She is Associate Editor of Water International.


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