Reflections on Water: New Approaches To Transboundary Conflict And Cooperation

Review: Reflections on Water: New Approaches To Transboundary Conflict And Cooperation Edited by Joachim Blatter and Helen Ingram Joachim Blatter, & Helen Ingram (Eds. ). Reflections on Water: New Approaches to Transboundary Conflict and Cooperation. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2001. 358 p. ISBN 0-262-52284-5 (trade paper). US26. 95 Water, considered by indigenous people to be a boundary or a gift of nature, has recently been reconsidered by capitalistic society as a commodity, that is, as property or a product. Bottled water can fetch a price at the supermarket. Farmers and civilians will pay money for water. When considered a problem or if there is a shortage, those with authority can solve water problems to the benefit of their constituencies. In Reflections On Water, the authors argue that we need to consider water in non-capitalistic terms, and that we now live in the postmodern age argues against the idea of grand historical narratives that ignore the perspectives of minority groups with different historical experiences. The focus of this fascinating work is not on how precious freshwater is, but on transboundary water which included border crossings of several types beyond those of political jurisdiction that the term usually implies (p. 3). The authors call for glocalization, a combined notion of globalization and localization, refers to the fact that the current explosion of international linkages and communications is not just a phenomenon of increased horizontal interaction, but also has to be understood in its vertical dimensions, characterized by direct mergers of local and global processes (p. 6). As the authors contend What glocalization contributes is a recognition of the greater importance of the local and global levels compared with the interposed national level. Even more important is the shift of emphasis from units, entities, or actors toward the flows, interactions, linkages, and bonds among these units (p. 7). Eight fascinating case studies illustrate that water issues supersede national boundaries and Western perspectives. Arguments over the Northwest salmon fisheries resources and large international bodies of water in Europe, like the Black Sea and Lake Constance, are detailed. In Chimaniman, Zimbabwe, rivers served as boundaries for African farms until modern mapping techniques used straight lines to demark property, in the process separating property line consideration from the topography of the land. At the American and Mexican border, the traditional belief of water as a gift of nature was ignored in the process of treating water as commodity. American settlers in the Southwest were able to lay claim to this water and control it to the detriment of the indigenous people of the area. …