Advertisement

Exploring the Rhône’s Transboundary Governance

  • Christian BréthautEmail author
  • Géraldine Pflieger
Chapter
First Online:
  • 98 Downloads
Part of the Palgrave Studies in Water Governance: Policy and Practice book series (PSWG)

Abstract

This chapter aims to introduce the book’s general perspective. It opens with an account of a sediment flushing operation that took place in Switzerland in 2012—an event which had serious impact on French territory downstream. This example simultaneously illustrates the challenges of transboundary river basin governance in general and the specifics of Rhône governance—a dual approach which is a guiding thread of this work. This general introduction then goes on to describe the book’s main objectives and research questions, as well as its overall structure.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in to check access.

Bibliography

  1. Arjoon, D., Tilmant, A., & Herrmann, M. (2016). Sharing water and benefits in transboundary river basins. Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 20(6), 2135–2150.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  2. Barraqué, B. (2001). Les enjeux de la Directive cadre sur l’eau de l’Union Européenne. Flux, 4, 70–75.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  3. Beniston, M., Stoffel, M., & Hill, M. (2011). Impacts of climatic change on water and natural hazards in the Alps: Can current water governance cope with future challenges? Examples from the European “ACQWA” project. Environmental Science & Policy, 14(7), 734–743.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  4. Bernauer, T. (2002). Explaining success and failure in international river management. Aquatic Sciences, 64(1), 1–19.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  5. Bhaduri, A., & Barbier, E. B. (2008). Political altruism of transboundary water sharing. The BE Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, 8(1). Google Scholar
  6. Birkland, T. A. (2004). “The world changed today”: Agenda-setting and policy change in the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks. Review of Policy Research, 21(2), 179–200.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  7. Boisson de Chazournes, L. (2008). Le droit international de l’eau: tendances récentes. Anuário Brasileiro de Direito Internacional, 2, 137–150.Google Scholar
  8. Brenner, N. (2004). New state spaces: Urban governance and the rescaling of statehood. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
  9. Bréthaut, C. (2016). River management and stakeholders’ participation: The case of the Rhone River, a fragmented institutional setting. Environmental Policy and Governance, 26(4), 292–305.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  10. Bréthaut, C., & Pflieger, G. (2015). The shifting territorialities of the Rhone River’s transboundary governance: A historical analysis of the evolution of the functions, uses and spatiality of river basin governance. Regional Environmental Change, 15(3), 549–558.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  11. Carter, C., & Smith, A. (2008). Revitalizing public policy approaches to the EU: ‘Territorial institutionalism’, fisheries and wine. Journal of European Public Policy, 15(2), 263–281.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  12. Conca, K. (2006). Governing water: Contentious transnational politics and global institution building. Cambridge and London: MIT Press.Google Scholar
  13. Daoudy, M. (2009). Asymmetric power: Negotiating water in the Euphrates and Tigris. International Negotiation, 14(2), 361–391.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  14. Dinar, S. (2009). Power asymmetry and negotiations in international river basins. International Negotiation, 14(2), 329–360.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  15. Dore, J., Lebel, L., & Molle, F. (2012). A framework for analysing transboundary water governance complexes, illustrated in the Mekong Region. Journal of Hydrology, 466, 23–36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  16. Eichenberger, R., & Frey, B. (1999). The new democratic federalism for Europe: functional, overlapping and competing jurisdiction. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.Google Scholar
  17. Enderlein, H., Walti, S., & Zurn, M. (2010). Handbook on multi-level governance. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.Google Scholar
  18. Garrick, D. E. (2015). Water allocation in rivers under pressure: Water trading, transaction costs and transboundary governance in the Western US and Australia. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.Google Scholar
  19. Gerber, J.-D., Knoepfel, P., Nahrath, S., & Varone, F. (2009). Institutional resource regimes: Towards sustainability through the combination of property-rights theory and policy analysis. Ecological Economics, 68(3), 798–809.  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolecon.2008.06.013.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  20. Gerlak, A. K. (2004). Strengthening river basin institutions: The global environment facility and the Danube River Basin. Water Resources Research, 40(8), 1–10.Google Scholar
  21. Graefe, O. (2011). River basins as new environmental regions? The depolitization of water management. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 14, 24–27.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  22. Hall, P. A., & Gingerich, D. W. (2009). Varieties of capitalism and institutional complementarities in the political economy: An empirical analysis. British Journal of Political Science, 39(3), 449–482.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  23. Hering, J. G., & Ingold, K. M. (2012). Water resources management: What should be integrated? Science, 336(6086), 1234–1235.Google Scholar
  24. Hooghe, L., & Marks, G. (2003). Unraveling the central state, but how? Types of multi-level governance. American Political Science Review, 97(2), 233–243.Google Scholar
  25. Hooper, B. (2006). Integrated water resources management: Governance, best practice, and research challenges. Journal of Contemporary Water Research and Education, 135(1), 1–7.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  26. Keohane, R. O., & Ostrom, E. (1994). Local commons and global interdependence. London: Sage.Google Scholar
  27. Kissling-Näf, I., & Kuks, S. (2004). The evolution of national water regimes in Europe. Dodrecht: Kluwer Academic.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  28. Lautze, J., Wegerich, K., Kazbekov, J., & Yakubov, M. (2013). International river basin organizations: Variation, options and insights. Water International, 38(1), 30–42.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  29. Lebel, L., Garden, P., & Imamura, M. (2005). The politics of scale, position, and place in the governance of water resources in the Mekong region. Ecology and Society, 10(2), 8.Google Scholar
  30. Malla, K. (2008). Current state of the law of international watercourses: Progress and paradigm shifts 1815–2008. Nordic Journal of International Law, 77(4), 461–508.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  31. Marty, F. (2001). Managing international rivers: Problems, politics and institutions. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (p. 409). Bern: Peter Lang Publishing.Google Scholar
  32. McCaffrey, S. C. (2014). International water cooperation in the 21st century: Recent developments in the law of international watercourses. Review of European, Comparative and International Environmental Law, 23(1), 4–14.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  33. Moss, T. (2003). Solving problems of ‘fit’ at the expense of problems of ‘interplay’? The spatial reorganisation of water management following the EU water framework Directive. In How institutions change (pp. 85–121). Wiesbaden: Springer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  34. Moss, T., & Newig, J. (2010). Multilevel water governance and problems of scale: Setting the stage for a broader debate. Berlin: Springer.Google Scholar
  35. Nahrath, S., Gerber, J.-D., Knoepfel, P., & Bréthaut, C. (2012). Gestion des ressources communes en Suisse: le rôle des institutions de gestion communautaire dans les politiques environnementales et d’aménagement du territoire. Natures Sciences Sociétés, 20(1), 39–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  36. Nahrath, S., Varone, F., & Gerber, J.-D. (2009). Les espaces fonctionnels: nouveau référentiel de la gestion durable des ressources? VertigO-La Revue Électronique En Sciences de l’environnement, 9(1). Google Scholar
  37. Ostrom, E. (1988). Institutional arrangements and the commons dilemma. In V. Ostrom, D. Feeny, & H. Picht (Eds.), Rethinking institutional analysis and development: Issues, alternatives, and choices (pp. 103–139). San Francisco: Institute for Contemporary Studies Press. Google Scholar
  38. Ostrom, E. (1990). Governing the commons: The evolution of institutions for collective action. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Retrieved from http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511807763.
  39. Ostrom, E. (2010). Beyond markets and states: Polycentric governance of complex economic systems. Transnational Corporations Review, 2(2), 1–12.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  40. Ostrom, E., Burger, J., Field, C. B., Norgaard, R. B., & Policansky, D. (1999). Revisiting the commons: Local lessons, global challenges. Science, 284(5412), 278–282.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  41. Priscoli, J. D. (1996). Conflict resoultion, collaboration and management in international and regional water resources issues. Belvoir, VA: Army Engineer Institute for Water Resources.Google Scholar
  42. Priscoli, J. D., & Wolf, A. T. (2009). Managing and transforming water conflicts. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
  43. Pritchard, S. B. (2011). Confluence: The nature of technology and the remaking of the Rhône (Vol. 172). Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
  44. Raadgever, G. T., Mostert, E., Kranz, N., Interwies, E., & Timmerman, J. G. (2008). Assessing management regimes in transboundary river basins: Do they support adaptive management? Ecology and Society, 13(1), 14.Google Scholar
  45. Reed, M. G., & Bruyneel, S. (2010). Rescaling environmental governance, rethinking the state: A three-dimensional review. Progress in Human Geography, 34(5), 646–653.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  46. Rieu-Clarke, A., & Kinna, R. (2014). Can two global UN water conventions effectively co-exist? Making the case for a ‘package approach’ to support institutional coordination. Review of European, Comparative and International Environmental Law, 23(1), 15–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  47. Sack, R. D. (1983). Human territoriality: A theory. Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 73(1), 55–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  48. Sadoff, C. W., & Grey, D. (2002). Beyond the river: The benefits of cooperation on international rivers. Water Policy, 4(5), 389–403.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  49. Sangare, I., & Larrue, C. (2004). The evolution of the water regime in France. In The evolution of national water regimes in Europe (pp. 187–234). Dordrecht: Springer.Google Scholar
  50. Sayre, N. F. (2005). Ecological and geographical scale: Parallels and potential for integration. Progress in Human Geography, 29(3), 276–290.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  51. Schmeier, S., Gerlak, A. K., & Blumstein, S. (2015). Governing international river and lake basins: Clearing the muddy waters of international river basin organizations.Google Scholar
  52. Scholz, J. T., & Stiftel, B. (2005). Introduction: The challenges of adaptive governance. Adaptive governance and water conflict: New institutions for collaborative planning (pp. 1–11). Washington, DC: Resources for the Future.Google Scholar
  53. Sneddon, C., & Fox, C. (2006). Rethinking transboundary waters: A critical hydropolitics of the Mekong basin. Political Geography, 25(2), 181–202.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  54. Suhardiman, D., & Giordano, M. (2012). Process-focused analysis in transboundary water governance research. International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, 12(3), 299–308.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  55. Suhardiman, D., Giordano, M., & Molle, F. (2012). Scalar disconnect: The logic of transboundary water governance in the Mekong. Society and Natural Resources, 25(6), 572–586.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  56. Swyngedouw, E. (2004). Scaled geographies: Nature, place, and the politics of scale. In Scale and geographic inquiry: Nature, society, and method (pp. 129–153). Oxford and Cambridge: Blackwell.Google Scholar
  57. Varone, F., Nahrath, S., Aubin, D., & Gerber, J.-D. (2013). Functional regulatory spaces. Policy Sciences, 46(4), 311–333.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  58. Varone, F., Reynard, E., Kissling-Näf, I., & Mauch, C. (2002). Institutional resource regimes: The case of water management in Switzerland. Integrated Assessment, 3(1), 78–94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  59. Warner, J., & Zawahri, N. (2012). Hegemony and asymmetry: Multiple-chessboard games on transboundary rivers. International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, 12(3), 215–229.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  60. Young, O. R. (2002). The institutional dimensions of environmental change: Fit, interplay, and scale. Cambridge: MIT press.Google Scholar
  61. Zeitoun, M., & Mirumachi, N. (2008). Transboundary water interaction I: Reconsidering conflict and cooperation. International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, 8(4), 297.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

Copyright information

© The Author(s) 2020

Authors and Affiliations

  1. 1.UNESCO Chair on hydropoliticsInstitute for Environmental Sciences, University of GenevaGenevaSwitzerland
  2. 2.UNESCO Chair on hydropoliticsInstitute for Environmental Sciences, University of GenevaGenevaSwitzerland

Personalised recommendations

Cite chapter

Buy options