ABSTRACT
This chapter attempts to identify the nature of constraints faced by a state which undertakes water management programmes on river systems that are also shared with other sovereign states.1 Such constraints can arise from cross-border contentions as well as internal contestations by concerned social groups. The roles of such internal and external constraints are explored below in the specific context of water management and flood control programmes in the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna (GBM) Delta lying within the boundaries of Bangladesh. The analysis focuses on the roles of (i) intellectual critiques of flood control from academics and professional groups; (ii) resistance to harmful project structures by adversely affected people at the grassroots and wider society; and (iii) interventions in shared rivers by upper riparian states.
