Transnational Conflicts Over Access to Water and Sanitation

The global supply of freshwater is finite and current estimates put freshwater availability at less than one-half of one percent of the total water stock. Intensive agriculture practices, rapid industrialization, and expanding population and urbanization are reducing freshwater supplies that are further stressed by climate change, placing enormous pressures on the already fragile environmental landscape. The World Wildlife Federation’s (WWF) Dam Initiative report identifies twenty-one river basins around the world at severe risk of ecological degradation: topping the list is the Yangtze in China, La Plata in South America, Tigris and Euphrates in Turkey, and the Ganges and Brahmaputra in India (WWF 2004). Although dams have proved to be a boon for irrigation and generating hydroelectric power, they have also severely disrupted ecosystems by interrupting the flow of major rivers, destroying freshwater habitats and leading to the disappearance of unique species, such as the freshwater river dolphins; dams have uprooted the livelihood of millions of 1 I would like to express my sincere gratitude and appreciation to the editors of HRHW, Joel R. Pruce and J. Eric Dibbern, and the anonymous reviewers for their critical suggestions and careful editorial guidance on earlier versions of this paper. I assume responsibility for any remaining errors. V O L U M E 8 – 2 0 0