Toward a socio-political approach to water management: successes and limitations of IWRM programs in rural north-western China

Abstract

In rural north-western China, the tension between economic growth and ecological crises demonstrates the limitations of dominant top-down approaches to water management. In the 1990s, the Chinese government adopted the Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) approach to combat the degradation of water and ecological systems throughout its rural regions. While the approach has had some success at reducing desertification, water shortage, and ecological deterioration, there are important limitations and obstacles that continue to impede optimum outcomes in water management. As the current IWRM approach is instituted through a top-down centralized bureaucratic structure, it often fails to address the socio-political context in which water management is embedded and therefore lacks a complete treatment of how power is embedded in the bureaucracy and how it articulates through economic growth imperatives set by the Chinese state. The approach has relied on infrastructure heavy and technocratic solutions to govern water demand, which has worked to undermine the focus on integration and public participation. Finally, the historical process through which water management mechanisms have been instituted are fraught with bureaucratic fragmentation and processes of centralization that work against some of its primary goals such as reducing uncertainty and risk in water management systems. This article reveals the historical, social, political, and economic processes behind these shortcomings in water management in rural north-western China by focusing on the limitations of a top-down approach that rely on infrastructure, technology, and quantification, and thereby advances a more holistic, socio-political perspective for water management that considers the state-society dynamics inherent in water governance in rural China.

Keywords

integrated water resources management / top-down implementation / inland river basin / water rights / China

References

[1] Aarnoudse E, Bluemling B, Qu W, Herzfeld T (2019). Groundwater regulation in case of overdraft: national groundwater policy implementation in north-west China. Int J Water Resour Dev, 35(2): 264–282

[2] Aarnoudse E, Qu W, Bluemling B, Herzfeld T (2017). Groundwater quota versus tiered groundwater pricing: two cases of groundwater management in north-west China. Int J Water Resour Dev, 33(6): 917–934

[3] Beeson M (2010). The coming of environmental authoritarianism. Env Polit, 19(2): 276–294

[4] Chen X, Bao A, Wang X, Japar G, Huang Y (2017). Ecological effect evaluation of comprehensive control project in Tarim River Basin. B Chinese Acad Sci, 32(1): 20–28

[5] Chien S, Hong D (2018). River leaders in China: party-state hierarchy and transboundary governance. Polit Geogr, 62: 58–67

[6] Cornwall A (2004). Introduction: new democratic spaces? The politics and dynamics of institutionalised participation. IDS Bull, 35(2): 1–10

[7] Cornwall A, Brock K (2005). What do buzzwords do for development policy? A critical look at ‘participation’, ‘empowerment’ and ‘poverty reduction’. Third World Q, 26(7): 1043–1060

[8] Crow-Miller B (2015). Discourses of deflection: the politics of framing China’s south-north water transfer project. Water Altern, 8(2): 173–192

[9] Crow-Miller B, Webber M, Rogers S (2017). The techno-politics of big infrastructure and the Chinese water machine. Water Altern, 10(2): 233–249

[10] Development and Reform Committee of Gansu Province, Water Resources Bureau, and Government of Jiuquan City (2011). Integrated Plan on Rational Water Resource Use and Ecological Conservation of Dunhuang. Approved by the State Council in 2011 (in Chinese)

[11] Fassnacht S R, Webb R W, Ma M (2018). Uncertainty in water resources: introduction to the special column. Front Earth Sci., 12(4): 649–652

[12] Fan X (2018). Harmonious relationship between water and humans—the review of the accomplishments in Minqin County’s water reform. Gansu Daily, Available at Gansu Government website (in Chinese)

[13] Gansu Water Resource Bureau (2008). Wuwei City reviews critical Shiyang River management solutions. Available at Gansu Government website (in Chinese)

[14] Gansu Water Resource Bureau (2017). Accelerate price reform of agricultural water by integrating multiple solutions. Available at Gansu Government website (in Chinese)

[15] Huang X (2007). The reflection on Tarim River’s comprehensive planing. Water Resources and Hydropower Engineering, 38(6) (in Chinese)

[16] Hook L (2013). China: high and dry. Financial Times. Available at Financial Time website

[17] Linton J, Budds J (2014). The hydrosocial cycle: defining and mobilizing a relational-dialectical approach to water. Geoforum, 57: 170–180

[18] Liu J, Yang W (2012). Water management water sustainability for China and beyond. Science, 337(6095): 649–650

[19] Loftus A (2009). Rethinking political ecologies of water. Third World Q, 30(5): 953–968

[20] Magee D (2013). The politics of water in rural China: a review of English-language scholarship. J Peasant Stud, 40(6): 1189–1208

[21] Mao K, Hanley E A (2018). State corporatism and environmental harm: tax farming and desertification in northwestern China. J Agrar Change, 18(4): 848–868

[22] Mao K, Zhang Q (2018). Dilemmas of state-led environmental conservation in China: environmental target enforcement and public participation in Minqin County. Soc Nat Resour, 31(5): 615–631

[23] Meehan K M (2014). Tool-power: water infrastructure as wellsprings of state power. Geoforum, 57: 215–224

[24] Minqin Bureau of Agriculture and Husbandry (2008). A Report of the Construction of Green Houses in Minqin County (in Chinese)

[25] Minqin Bureau of Finance (2018). Minqin county December 2018 fiscal analysis (in Chinese)

[26] Minqin County Government (2015a). Minqin County Government’s Announcement about Water Price Reform (in Chinese)

[27] Minqin County Government (2015b). Minqin County’s Implementation Plan of High Standard Farmland Construction (in Chinese)

[28] Minqin County Government (2016a). Minqin County Government’s Announcement about Printing and Publishing the 2016 Implementation Plan of High Standard Farmland Construction (in Chinese)

[29] Minqin County Government (2016b). Minqin County’s Plan on Eliminating and Transforming Idle Agricultural Sheds (in Chinese)

[30] Minqin County Government (2018). Minqin Water Allocation Plan (in Chinese)

[31] Ministry of Water Resources (2002). Short-term Governance Plan of Hei River Watershed. China Water & Power Press (in Chinese)

[32] Ministry of Water Resources (MWR), National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) (2007). Key Governance Plan of Shiyang River Watershed. Document No. 3378 [2007] of Development & Reform and Agricultural Economy (in Chinese)

[33] Mollinga P P (2008). Water, politics and development: framing a political sociology of water resources management. Water Altern, 1(1): 7–23

[34] Moore S M (2014a). Hydropolitics and inter-jurisdictional relationships in China: the pursuit of localized preferences in a centralized system. China Q, 219: 760–780

[35] Moore S M (2014b). Modernisation, authoritarianism, and the environment: the politics of China’s south-north water transfer project. Env Polit, 23(6): 947–964

[36] Moore S M (2015). The development of water markets in China: progress, peril, and prospects. Water Policy, 17(2): 253–267

[37] Moore S M (2019). Legitimacy, development and sustainability: understanding water policy and politics in contemporary China. China Q, 237: 153–173

[38] Mostert E (2003). The challenge of public participation. Water Policy, 5(2): 179–197

[39] Mukhtarov F G (2008). Intellectual history and current status of integrated water resources management: a global perspective. In Claudia Pahl-Wostl, Pavel Kabat, Jörn Möltgen, eds. Adaptive and integrated water management. Berlin: Springer

[40] Nickum J (2010). Water policy reform in China’s fragmented hydraulic state: focus on self-funded/managed irrigation and drainage districts. Water Altern, 3(3): 537–551

[41] Nickum J, Shaofeng J, Scott M (2017). The three red lines and China’s water resource management policy in the twenty-first century. In: Sternfeld E, eds. Routledge Handbook on China’s Environmental Policy. Abingdon: Earthscan, 71–82

[42] Norman E S, Bakker K, Cook C (2012). Introduction to the themed section: water governance and the politics of scale. Water Altern, 5(1): 52–61

[43] Norman E S, Cook C, Cohen A (2015). Introduction: why the politics of scale matter in the governance of water. In: Christina Cook, Emma S. Norma, eds. Negotiating Water Governance: Why the Politics of Scale Matter. Farnham: Ashgate

[44] Pohlner H (2016). Institutional change and the political economy of water megaprojects: China’s south-north water transfer. Glob Environ Change, 38: 205–216

[45] Reed M S (2008). Stakeholder participation for environmental management: a literature review. Biol Conserv, 141(10): 2417–2431

[46] Rogers S, Crow-Miller B (2017). The politics of water: a review of hydropolitical frameworks and their application in China. WIRes Water, 4(6): e1239

[47] Schneider R L (2010). Integrated, watershed-based management for sustainable water resources. Front Earth Sci China, 4(1): 117–125

[48] Shen D (2014). Post-1980 water policy in China. Int J Water Resour Dev, 30(4): 714–727

[49] Shen D (2015). Groundwater management in China. Water Policy, 17(1): 61–82

[50] Shi J (2014). China’s essential environmental repair projects revived the downstream of Tarim River. Technology Daily. June 22 (in Chinese)

[51] Shi P (2010). What would Minqin do? Retrieved from South Review Available at Sina website. (in Chinese)

[52] Song Z (2016). Gansu Province pushes for comprehensive agricultural water price reform. Gansu Daily (in Chinese)

[53] Spijkers O, Dai L, Li X (2018). Public Participation in China’s Water Governance. Chinese Journal of Environmental Law, 2(1): 28–56

[54] State Council of China (2001). The reply of Hei River management plan. Letter No. 86 [2001] of the State Council (in Chinese)

[55] Swyngedouw E (2009). The political economy and political ecology of the hydro-social cycle. J Contemp Water Res Educ, 142(1): 56–60

[56] Taylor P L, Sonnenfeld D A (2017). Water crises and institutions: Inventing and reinventing governance in an era of uncertainty. Soc Nat Resour, 30(4): 395–403

[57] United States Agency for International Development (2007). What is integrated water resources management? Washington, DC: United States Agency for International Development. Available at USAID website

[58] Wang J, Huang J, Rozelle S, Huang Q, Blanke A (2007). Agriculture and groundwater development in northern China: trends, institutional responses, and policy options. Water Policy, 9(S1): 61–74

[59] Wang R Y, Ng C N, Lenzer J H Jr, Dang H, Liu T, Yao S (2017). Unpacking water conflicts: a reinterpretation of coordination problems in China’s water-governance system. Int J Water Resour Dev, 33(4): 553–569

[60] Water Resources Bureau, Development and Reform Committee of Xinjiang Autonomous Region. (2001). Short-term Governance Plan of Tarim River Watershed. Approved by Letter No. 74 [2001] of the State Council (in Chinese)

[61] Webber M, Han X (2017). Corporations, Governments, and socioenvironmental policy in China: China’s water machine as assemblage. Ann Assoc Am Geogr, 107(6): 1444–1460

[62] Xiao S, Xiao H, Mi L, Li L, Lu Z, Peng X (2017). The evaluation of Hei River’s comprehensive treatment plan. B Chinese Acad Sci, 32(1): 45–54 (in Chinese)

[63] Xinhua News (2014). State Council: 172 Hydraulic Projects will be built during the 13th Five Year Plan. Available at People CN website (in Chinese)

[64] Yang X, Lu X, Ran L (2016). Sustaining China’s large rivers: river development policy, impacts, institutional issues and strategies for future improvement. Geoforum, 69: 1–4

[65] Yao J, Zhou P (2016). The importance of water law. Economy and Social Development, 14(6): 44–48 (in Chinese)

[66] Yao Z, Wang T, Yang J, Zhu K, Zhou L (2008). Analysis of Frequently Occurrence of Dust Storm in the Alxa Plateau. J Arid Land Resour Environ, 9: 54–61 (in Chinese)

[67] Yu C, Xu Y, Lin S (2010). Literature Review on Integrated Water Resource Management. Yellow River, 32(12): 12–15 (in Chinese)

[68] Yu X, Geng Y, Heck P, Xue B (2015). A review of China’s rural water management. Sustainability, 7(5): 5773–5792

[69] Zhong F, Xu Z, Jumpei Kubota, Li J, Akiyama Tomohiro (2014). Analysis on institutional change of water resource distribution policy of Heihe River. J Ec Water Resources, 32(5): 37–42 (in Chinese)

Acknowledgements

This study was funded by the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (2016-JX07) and the 2017-8 CLA Professional Development Program of Colorado State University. The authors have no conflict of interest to declare. The first author would like to thank Dr. Arthur Tzao of Taipei Medical University for saving his life in October 2018.

RIGHTS & PERMISSIONS

2020 Higher Education Press