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Lecture 19

11/6/2014 2:15:00 PM

Week 11 resources and development, the global water crisis


Water = basic human right
Define drinkable water/sanitation as millennium development goals

Oil, oil dependency, coltan..


o Drug violence mexico, gangs and maras in Guatemala,
warlordism in afghanistan, violent entrepreneurs in russia,
Caucasus
Resources rise of armed groups political instability
in states in global south
Just because you have a lot of a resource doesnt
necessarily lead to civil war (DETERMINISM)
Dont assume certain resource dependencies
produce these types of outcomes all the time
i.e. oil producing in Norway
o Resource can be politicized..
State capturing oil revenues in Nigeria, politics turns
around
Oil looted/predated funding bad guys, organized

crime
Not inevitable.
Mexico and the Drug War 60k killed 2006-2014, 1.6 mil disappeared
Explosion of violence, homicide rate in Juarez 170 per 100,000
Map, showing types of drugs being moved, territorial.
o Failed state- Somalia, bc not exercising authority
(partialized.. something)
o Challenge to mexico is it fragile or failed?
No, functioning democracy with corruption, but

institutions are in place.


Gangs/cartels = threat/counterweight to state authority
2006 long standing political power in mexico residing in
revolutionary party were defeated in election decentralization of
political authority to the states.
o Resources, source of predation/ looting, funding criminal
organizations.. cartels sometimes operating together
(confederation in 2008, to hold off efforts of central gov)

o Long standing cartels


o Los Zetas (most violent of all groups)
Were elite military forces in mexico, violence shot
through the roof in 2006 bc militant people inserting
themselves into already violent drug trade
Lack of state authority/willingness/capacity to
prosecute.
Complicity bw gov elected officials and security
forces, and judiciary to regulate.
porous boundary
o Violent resource, but could be other resources too
o Any trade n illegal commodity predisposes to violence but
violence is product of state weakness.
Mafia emerged in mid 19th c., in Sicily, as set of
protection services, protecting powerful rural class
interests in Sicilian countryside in context of weakness
of the state/state security and growing class conflicts
bw peasants and landowners
Mafia classic case. Resource politics growing in
situations, out of these weak fragile state
institutions
1990s explosion of mafia groups (roof) often
unemployed former soviet athletes parts of sports
clubs, drawn into providing protection, needed to
have a roof to do business in any form.
Emerging in context of weak instutions, particular coalitions, weak senses of
security and justice. Unevenly implemented rule of law, corrupt judiciary,
unprepared military/in the business with the bad guys

Water

Any resource is not necessarily predisposed to something!


Material qualities, different geographies, all matter, attributes can
allow them to be predated/looted, but not inevitable. Depends on
political context, state fragility/exclusive institutions.

Resource how does it get politicized, how does it enter into not a profit for
state but has to be provided to everyone (basic human right)
Things central to and independent of global climate change and what it may
mean for water
World population growing..
Green revolution (in india context, imposing new demands on
agriculture)
Proportion of people chronically short of water will rise to 45% (4
billion) by 2050
o 10-15 yrs ago, in development, not talking about global water
crisis.
o Urban transformation (living in cities, huge mega cities, slums
without access to drinking water/sanitation)
o Proportion of Indians defecating outside
Access to sanitation.. in midst of indian economic
miracle
Global issue, framed in many ways
Demography (demand by demands of agricultural systems..
population)
Sao Paulo State
Running out of water
44 mil peeps. Worst drought in 80 yrs
6 reservoirs supply to city, each has 4% of capacity.
Brazilian water board Sau Paulo could run out of water in 2
weeks.
o Rationing of water, closing schools early, restaurants close
bathrooms
o Brazil has more freshwater than any other part of the
continent (12% global fresh water is in that country!)
Unlike oil/coltan, water is renewable. Oil is non renewable (in geological
time, yes but not in human history)
Water plenty of it..
Yemen, likely to become the first country on fossil water (deep
aquifers pumping).. will run out of water.
o Getting access to water in certain places can be tricky
Where is the water? Where is the population?

Need to get the water to those places..


Water just because it is a fluid is not easy or cheap to move
o Costly
Largest consumption of energy in california - transporting water, moving it
into LA basin.
Getting it there is not cheap or easy.
Global/national availability.. brazil has a lot of water
Inter-annual availability
o Varying
Areas of high urban consumption, density of pop water
availability is function of precipitation..
Will be intraseasonal and inter annual availability and larger
disrupting events..
o Global climate change part of sau Paulo story
o Tropical rainforest story
Relationship between having lots of trees/forests and
likelihood of precipitation
After 10 yrs global deforestation of Brazil has been decreasing.. latest
figures 190% increase in tropical deforestation since 2011.

Big issue in politics in brazil, wrapped up in land reforms.


Way in which water is managed
o Places with lots of water can be subject to water shortage on
a huge scale!
o Context of great urbanization story global water crisis has
visibility now that it didnt have a while ago
Water as key basic human right..
Contradictions to something seemingly renewable/always available
and existence of absolute scarcity

Sau Paulo, most inner city neighbor hoods, dont get water for 6-12
hrs a day
Water story in relationship to resources in general
How does water/politics of water compare to oil story?
Resources
Available in nature, capable of being transformed into things that
are useful for humans

o Some require little transformation, some a lot (water has to


be purified)
Natural resources are cultural, technical, political (oil valiancy bc
everyone depends on it, strategic geopolitical resource), economic
appraisal of elements , fulfilling particular kinds of social objectives
and goals through specific material practices.

Oil

Fluid.. lots of things involved in transformation


Extraordinary hydro carbon
Resource with lots of elements in it that we could use, esp. for
pharmaceutical/chemical industry
Involves transformations (technical) into things that produce petro
chemical hydrocarbon that we make use for
o Transportation, industrial, buildings, electrical power
Majority motor gas
Where is it? The reserves
o Middle east, Africa geography to it
o Different types of hydrocarbons
Oil conventional form of hydrocarbons

Other forms of hydrocarbons framed as


transition fuels bc relatively cleaner
shale gas natural gas
great transition
o hydraulic fracking = WATER issue!

o Biofeuls
Tar..
If oil prices reach a certain level, transforming tar sands
into oil is another method.. expensive..
Northern alberta massive transformation to get
it
How much is there? And if its finite/non renewable, whats the point
in which the rate of extraction is maximized?
o Peak oil debate
o Have we reached globally/nationally peak oil
In terms of oil, we would peak in ~1975

Weather in global terms/other countries debate, have


we reached peak oil?
Have we reached max rate of extraction?
Some people say globally we reached it..
Some 2030
o Consequences could be a big issue.
If we have infact reached peak oil, then from here on,
coutnries that have control over reserves could leverage
prices causing shockwaves.
Who are major actors?

o Trans national oil companies (NOCs)


Up until recently, big private companies werent in
business of water
Government typically municipal provision
In California, debate over pricing associated with
municipal provision of water
Water historically has been so underpriced
through municipal provision incentive to
over use it.
o National companies and transnational oil companies
o Oil as set of resources (hydrocarbons) part of carbon cycle
Carbon circulating in global systems in complex ways..
could be produced.. absorbed..
Carbon Storage
Carbon reservoirs
Carbon fluxes (moving from one form of reserve
to another)
Politics of the Carbon Cycle

When it gets captured by governments, what do they do with it?


When predated by others
o Political issue
Coal burning power plants
Offshore oil spills
Deforestation
Burning releasing carbon emissions
Carbon emissions and regulation

Water

Oil-predation and insurgencies


Oil states and rents
Qualities and properties of oil.. focusing on global south, the politics
(i.e. in Nigeria)
o Taking resources/property/ nature of control..
Also part of global cycle, can look at forms in global terms
Global precipitation, evaporation, evapotranspiration, and runoff
(annual water cycle globally)
o Quantity, quality, ownership?,

Who owns water.. how does it enter in to market place?


Not a world water market..
If municipally owned, not private owned
commodity but a type of commons
o Who has access? Is it a commodity or commons?
Thinking about water through oil.. looks a little different
70% freshwater locked in ice, 70% available freshwater used to grow food
fresh water needed to consume/grow food.
70% in ice big proportion not availbel.

o Most of rest in aquifers draining quicker than natural recharge


rate
2/3 water used to grow food not for consumption.
Where water comes from
Oceans, freshwater (mostly in glacier/permafrost)
o Small amount available to us..
Where it goes
Agriculture (most), domestic/other industrial, power, evaporation
from reservoirs..
Water is..
Unsubstitutable in its most important uses
o Could substitute oil for other types of energy! Water.. not
really
Unevenly distributed geographically
Difficult to capture
o Lots of precipitation, but process of capturing/moving cheaply
not easy

Movable, but often only at great social, economic, or ecological cost


o No easy/quick fix to drought
Highly variable over time in its availability
o If dependent on rainforest precipitation/run-off, is variable
o Global climate change making it in complex ways more
variable.
Different properties, complex set of things that shape how you get it to
everyone reliably, efficiently, cleanly for consumption, agriculture,
sanitation.
Transnational development issue

worlds major rivers cross borders


Millenium Development Goal 3 water provision
o Enormous progress since 2000 in getting people clean water
o Sanitation is a whole other story..
2015 cut off date to MDG, most parts of the world not
reaching sanitation levels
Water estimates for drinking/cooking/bathing/laundry etc.
Global climate change shaping and changing this makes it more of a
global issue.
Global Average 250 liters per person per day
Arizona 1000 LPD (liters p day)
Scarcity Threshold 50 LPD
Bottom two billion less than 20 LPD
Slum Dwellers avg 10 lpd
Extreme water scarcity 5 LPD
What sort of water scarcity absolute or relative?
Not scarce..
But issue water is unevenly distributed, and scarcity in many
cases has been induced by policy failures.
o Managing reservoirs given variability
Scarcity may become absolute problem (yemen)
o If all water dependent on fossil aquifer (incredibly pure water)
finite, non renewable water resource
Most often relative scarcity, not available at the right time
Dual Nature of Water Crisis
Water for life

o Widespread violation of basic human right to water


o Leads to ~2 m child deaths avoidable, huge gender
inequalities, losses in wealth creation
o Uclean water trapping millions of worlds poorest people in
cycles of deprivation
Diarrheal diseases in children stopping them from going
to school
Improving school attendance by diminishing diseases
intervention!
Sanitation better child education! great other
things
Also tied to child mortality
Water for livelihoods
Where you get your water from has effects.
Bottled water becoming incredibly expensive way of getting
portable water for poor communities
If part of water grid with collective faucet may be working 1-2 hrs a
day
The Human costs of the crisis

1.8 mil children die each yr as result of diarrhea (4,900 deaths a


day)
o equivilant to under 5 population in London and new york
combined.
Lots of studies show women provision over water, spending time in
rural agrarian communities with pots to get water.. access/where
you get it from
o Issue of gender rights
o Spend up to 4 hrs a day collecting water!
Almost 50% all people in developing countries suffering from health
problem caused by water and sanitation deficits.
o Huge environmental pollution and urban community that is a
petri dish of human disease
o Produce high rates of morbidity
Are there cheaper and more efficient ways? Engineering
questions with big numbers, urban inflection of
sanitation

Pressing issues that big multilateral development


agencies are now working with (world bank, etc.)
1950s governments and institutions like world bank prepared to give lots
of money for infrastructural products
slowed in 70s/80s/90s,
water questions now about mega engineering infrastructural probs
Stock and Flow
Renewable or Non Renewable
o Water renewable flow resource as opposed to non
renewable stock resource

Is there a situation comparable to peak oil?


peak water?
o in some circumstances (like yemen), can be unrenewable. But
for most part you dont..
possible to run up against flow limits (sao Paulo.. flow prob)
Is water (crisis) like oil (crisis?
Oil/water have different properties
Water vs oil
o Oil finite, non renewable, long distance transport

economically viable, wide range of alternatives can substitute


o Water literally finite, but unlimited (At a cost), renewable
butwith locally non renewable stocks, long distance treansport
not economically viable, no subsittutes for most purposes
Not peak water, but certain types of peak water situations

11/6/2014 2:15:00 PM

11/6/2014 2:15:00 PM

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