ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on state-building processes and their impact on the management of water resources and water-supply infrastructure. The chapter is divided into two sections: 1. Water and state-building through a historical perspective, and 2. Types of states and water management. The first section aims to understand how water played a role (or not) in the emergence of early forms of statehood in antiquity, then moves on to analyze whether and how water ownership became an element in the consolidation of the state. We will subsequently argue that the birth of the modern nation state had a profound impact on the management of and decision-making over water resources at multiple levels (local, national and international). In a second section, we will undertake a ‘typology of states’ analyzing, a) the role of the modern state and large-scale water projects, b) revisionist states in relation to border disputes, c) frontier states and the search for water, and d) finally failed states and the key issue of access to water.
