ABSTRACT
The chapter presents a case study of the Azraq area in Eastern Jordan where agricultural, domestic and environmental users compete for shrinking groundwater resources. Responding to key research questions in this volume, it analyses the WEF nexus situation through the lens of pertinent SDGs, evaluates the government’s policy-mix as well as coordination mechanisms in light of the 2030 Agenda‘s core principles and asked for the role of political-institutional context factors. The chapter finds strong trade-offs among several SDGs and their targets related to SDGs 2, 6, 7, 8, and 15, including within SDG 6. The government’s recent policy-mix to govern access to groundwater combines regulatory and market-based instruments. It has had some effects on farmers, but enforcement privileges individuals with personal connections (wasta), negatively affecting leave no one behind. In the monarchy, centralized top-down governance prevails and inter-sectoral and multi-level coordination are limited, negatively affecting interconnectedness and indivisibility. Multi-stakeholder partnerships are rare and a past plan for participatory groundwater management in Azraq was never implemented. Overall, the case shows limits of Jordanian autocratic regime to deal with the complexities of the 2030 Agenda in view of resource scarcity.
