ABSTRACT
Given water's central role in wealth creation and social power, contemporary institutional approaches to water for development function as a sub-set of mainstream international development theories and practices. In particular, they reflect the liberal institutionalist belief that functional economic and political cooperation leads to mutually-beneficial outcomes for all parties; that this cooperation can be engineered through institution building; and appropriately structured institutions can manage stakeholder competition, build capacity, balance interests, and minimize conflict. Supporting these institutions are developmental practices firmly rooted in modernization: scientific innovation; human, technical and financial resource capacity building; profit-oriented capitalist approaches to production and service delivery. These institutions are Western/modernist in origin, functionalist in nature, reformist in vision and alignment-oriented in emphasis. Despite sustained efforts for change – multi-level basin organizations, stakeholder engagement, bottom-up decision-making, adaptive management, collaborative planning – and the policies, laws and procedures put in place to support action, outcomes are mixed. Historical practices, philosophies and cosmologies, irrespective of Western analyses regarding their utility, are not easily displaced, nor should they necessarily be. While there are positive aspects of liberal institutionalist approaches to water for development, there is a need for deeper reflection regarding the epistemological and ontological foundations for action.
