institutional analysis

WP 4 -- Institutional Analysis

Institutions for pro-poor water access and

use

INTERNATIONAL FOOD POLICY RESEARCH INSTITUTE

Questions to WP4

1. Who controls blue water?

2. How do institutions at multiple levels interact to

facilitate or inhibit access to water?

3. What are the incentives for providing poor people

with access to water? / How can water institutions

help alleviate poverty?

4. How are institutions modified to cope with

hydrology?

5. What institutions manage droughts or flood

hazards?

ScaleTemporal

Drip

kit

Collective

MarketingCoordination

Property Rights

low high

high

Type of

Institution

low

region

Spatial

plot

Tube

well

Terracing

Treadle

pump

Short

term

Long

term

Large canal systems

Watershed

Management

Small reservoirDrainage

Salinity Control


Coordination institutions

• Can be provided by:

• State (a public tubewell that supplies many farms),

• Collective action (farmer group)

• Markets (farmer selling water).

• Which is most appropriate depends on:

• Scale

• Technical sophistication of technology and farmers

• Cultural factors (social capital, market orientation)

• Capacity of state, market institutions, etc.

Types of Coordinating

Institutions

MarketCollective

State

Market

Collective

State

Types of Coordinating Institutions by Spatial and

Temporal Scale

Spatial—large-

scale, complex

Small-scale, low


For group-based approaches

• Look beyond formal rules and membership roles • Is the group acting collectively

• Who is included and excluded from active membership and decision-making.

• Women/men

• Land owners/ tenants

• Farmers/ other water users (fishers, livestock keepers, home gardens, domestic users, other enterprises).

• Formal and informal barriers to participation

• Different motivations and returns


For group-based approaches

• Active participation of men and women can be more effective by drawing on skills, resources of both

• But costs of mixed organizations also greater, especially where high gender segregation

• Consider when identifying which groups to work with, particularly if that organization will gain stronger control over technology or water

• More than setting up the organizations-- need to become internalized and ‘institutionalized’


Water Rights

• “the claims, entitlements and related obligations

among people regarding the use and disposition

of a scarce resource”

• Rights accompanied by duties:

• Duties of rights-holders

• Duties of others to respect those rights

• Rights vs. access


Why Do Water Rights Matter?

• Water is essential for life and livelihoods• Water rights are key assets

• Determine distribution of benefits

• Rights clarify • Who can use, manage water

• What responsibilities they have

• Increasing interaction between uses within basins• Need better “rules of the game” to coordinate water use

• Secure rights can provide incentives for investment, conservation

• Projects often change property rights

• Recognized rights provide “seat at the table” for negotiations over changes in water use


Need to Go Beyond Simplistic Assumptions

“There are no water rights here”

or

“The State owns all water”

Careful analysis reveals multiple types and holders of

water rights

Important implications for water management—equity,

efficiency, environment


Property Rights

• All rights don’t derive from the state

(government)—also from project regulations, local

custom, religious law, etc.

• Rights are only as strong as the institution that

stands behind them

• Customary rights may be stronger than those

determined by the state

International

Religious

State

Basin

Local/ customary


Some Critical Questions

• How are rights recognized?

• Who holds rights?

• For how long?

• To do what?

• From what source? • What about return flows and groundwater?

• Transferable?

• Environmental allocations?

� “sticks in the bundle of rights”


Multiple Uses Multiple Users

• Field crop irrigation

• Household gardens

• Livestock

• Fishing

• Harvesting lotus, reeds

• Industry/enterprises

• Domestic use

• Recreation

• Religion

• By occupational

• By gender

• By generation within the

household

• By location

• Look for marginalized groups


Water Rights Reform

• Acknowledge existing rights, esp. of

marginalized groups

• Participatory inventories

• Avoid “cadastre disasters”

• Gradual and selective licensing

• Two-way education and communications

• Interactive planning and modeling

• Legal literacy

• Strategically strengthen agencies and users


Water rights reforms

• Laws and policies are important, but not the sole

determinant of water rights

• Reforms should be based on solid understanding

of existing rights

• Rapid reforms can be counter-productive, unlikely

to be fully implemented as planned

• Negotiation with stakeholders, looking for ways to

compensate, leads to more legitimacy


Beyond panaceas

• Not social engineering—institutions are organic,

path dependent

• Need range of technical and institutional options

• Understanding to be able to tailor them to their

physical and institutional context


Questions to WP4

1. Who controls blue water? Urban-based power

structures

2. How do institutions at multiple levels interact to

facilitate or inhibit access to water? At higher

levels more government and lower level more

CA institutions; (irrigation) water-related

organizations seldom have a mandate for

poverty alleviation; once water becomes

scarce, power structures tend to exclude

weaker users, unless they have strong property

rights


Questions to WP4

3. What are the incentives for providing poor

people with access to water?/What water

institutions can help alleviate poverty? National

food security (irrigation), job creation, rural

development (to avoid migration), health

concerns

4. How are institutions modified to cope with

hydrology? – Institutions following hydrologic

boundaries, but often powerless, need to

ensure that they are empowered


Questions to WP4

5. What institutions manage droughts or flood

hazards?—Farmers tend to lose out first when

droughts occur (national laws) or

implementation; again strong property rights

needed for farmers to have a share in water-

scarce situations


Institutional Research for WP4

a) What is the link between water access, poverty

and wellbeing?-- Is lack of access to water a

contributor to poverty?

b) Look at existing power structures (administrative,

political) and how they are linked to basins and

water institutions

c) Identify institutions that fit the current power

structures while helping the water-poor: Ex: pay

farmers to use less water� more water for

domestic/industry—examine feasibility



d) Create a voice for the poor (India� media,

panchayat, Supreme Court; Andes, similar);

e) Possibility to transfer obligatory stakeholder

consultation processes of developed countries

f) Alternatively, identify the possibility to generate

alliances (Sabatier/Schlager); f.ex. Alliance with

environmental organizations to protect

biodiversity



g) How can water institutions help alleviate

poverty?—Recognition of traditional water

rights (Andes) to obtain compensation when

water is transferred out

h) When there is drought—identify mechanisms

that support sharing of information, water, and

compensation



�High impact interventions can be on institutions

�High impact interventions require conducive

institutions and infrastructure� f.ex. Volumetric

pricing at village level has lead to water savings in

parts of China, but would not work in most of India,

�Adoptability can only be assured once institutional

issues are taken into account

institutional analysis

Education

rights rights

livelihoods water rights

water rights reform

water rights matter

water rights hereorthe

duties of rights

blue water

customary rights