ABSTRACT
This highly interactive workshop is inspired by Legislative Theatre – a participatory law-making process created by Augusto Boal. It explores our relationship with rivers and the laws and regulations that govern them. The provocative experience intentionally frustrates to animate discussion about the challenges of upholding the rights of rivers and invites us to reflect on the issues. The workshop begins by using role play to illustrate the unequal bargaining power between stakeholders as well as the inadequate safeguarding against river pollution. It then compares different stakeholders’ priorities, and concerns, and invites workshop participants to discuss them in an open consultation forum. The performance takes place in a courtroom, where the judge explains that negotiations between the various stakeholders have failed again. The judge then outlines the Rights of Rivers Declaration and the possible penalties that may be imposed on the fictitious water company. Workshop participants become members of the jury who are tasked with deciding which penalty should apply to the scenario.
