ABSTRACT
ABSTRACT: The current state of glocal water governance (global through to local) confirms that successful attempts to design instruments and approaches to improve water governance must take complex historical and contextual issues into account. Broad concepts in governance-sustainable development, integrated water resource management, good governance-are illusory and failure prone; nor is there a straightforward answer on where power should be located-centralisation versus decentralisation, the roles of private sector and stakeholder participation. While best aid delivery in water governance is constantly evolving, current insights can be useful in framing water management; and understanding the complex science-policy interface is critical to water governance design and local capacity building. Recommendations can neither be scaled up nor transferred to other regions, only transformed by knowledge brokers especially when local constituencies are interested. There is need to focus more on policies with a high compliance pull than conceptual utopias.
