ABSTRACT
This chapter seeks to answer the question why local actors are most vulnerable to (violent) conflicts over water. It attempts to explain how political, socio-economic and environmental processes increase the competition over the available water resources, social outcomes and probable conflict dynamics thereof. This chapter builds on a strong bottom-up approach on micro-level features of vulnerability (i.e. social vulnerability, contextual [resource] vulnerability and governmental vulnerability) and adaptive capacity in combination with a macro-level analysis of both the identified (inter)national stakeholders and the institutional framework factors (discussed in Chapter 3). Subsequently, it discusses how vulnerability, low adaptive capacity and resulting social implications contribute to an increase in the risk of conflict, especially for local-level actors. The final section summarizes and links the findings of the sections and provides answers to the two guiding questions above.
