Rearticulating the Environmental Social Contract: Sustainability Governance and Gendered Exclusions in Morocco’s Land–Water Nexus

This article investigates how contemporary sustainability governance transforms the environmental social contract within Morocco’s land-water nexus. The paper focuses on two key initiatives, the Green Morocco Plan and the Noor Ouarzazate solar complex, to demonstrate how modern sustainability efforts reshape colonial and postcolonial approaches to land and water management. It utilizes environmental social contract theory to examine state legitimacy through recognition, provision, protection and participation by elucidating how historically layered exclusions are organized through gendered access to land and water. Through empirical analysis, the paper shows how large-scale farmers and renewable energy infrastructure are buffered from the effects of intensifying water scarcity. In contrast, small-scale farmers, particularly women, face growing livelihood insecurity amid climate-induced drought conditions, restricted dam releases and limited access to state support. Overall, the article demonstrates how sustainability governance narrows recognition and redistributes environmental risk onto those already marginalized within Morocco’s land and water governance.