Poisoned Spring

Steven P. McGiffen, Kartika Liotard

Description

Vast numbers of people have no access to safe drinking water, and even more lack any kind of effective sanitation. Most of the world's water supply remains in public ownership. Neither drought nor flood is as much a meteorological phenomenon as it is the result of mismanagement. So is privatisation the route to solving this most urgent of problems?



The authors argue that, on the contrary, neoliberal economics and the power structures responsible for widening global inequalities are blocking the way to progress towards universal provision of safe water and effective sanitation. Behind these malign influences stands the growing power of the European Union and the corporations in whose interests it operates.



On the basis of an analysis of the political economy of water and of the European Union's policies, Poisoned Spring will place the problem of water supply in the broad context of corporate control of the world's resources.
Introduction

1. Drought and Deprivation

2. Flood

3. Conflict and Cooperation

4. It Never Rains But It Pours: Climate Change, Water Shortage, and Flood

5. The European Union Within its Borders: Why privatisation? The ideology behind the theft of public property

6. European Union Within Its Borders, Part 2: The Water Framework Directive

7. The European Union Beyond Its Borders

8. A Better Water Policy is Possible

Bibliography

Index

Sujets

• International Relations
• POLITICAL SCIENCE
• Sciences et techniques
• Natural Resources
• General officer
• European Union
• General
• Nature

Informations

• Publié par: Pluto Press
• Date de parution: 20 mai 2009
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781849644044
• Langue: English

Extrait

Poisoned Spring

Poisoned Spring The EU and Water Privatisation

KARTIKA LIOTARD and STEVEN P. McGIFFEN

PLUTO PRESS www.plutobooks.com

First published 2009 by Pluto Press 345 Archway Road, London N6 5AA and 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010

www.plutobooks.com

Distributed in the United States of America exclusively by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of St. Martin’s Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010

Copyright © Kartika Liotard and Steven P. McGiffen 2009

The right of Kartika Liotard and Steven P. McGiffen to be identified as the authors of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN ISBN

978 0 7453 2789 1 978 0 7453 2788 4

Hardback Paperback

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data applied for

This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the environmental standards of the country of origin. The paper may contain up to 70 per cent postconsumer waste.

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Designed and produced for Pluto Press by Chase Publishing Services Ltd, Sidmouth, England Typeset from disk by Stanford DTP Services, Northampton, England Printed and bound in the European Union by CPI Antony Rowe, Chippenham and Eastbourne

CONTENTS

Acknowledgements Acronyms and abbreviations

Introduction: A Dangerous Synergy Climate change – Drought and water scarcity – Extreme weather events – Bad weather, bad politics, catastrophic economics – The Problem of uncertainty – Water, health and development – The European Union and the politics of water – A call to activism – Structure of the book

1DroughtandDeprivation Defining drought – How much water do we need? – Population growth and drought – Urbanisation and drought – Pollution as a source of water shortage – Climate change and drought – The environmental effects of drought – The socioeconomic consequences of drought – Planning for drought – Desertification

2 Flood The environmental consequences of flood – The socio economic consequences of flood – Flood control: good, bad and indifferent – Physical barriers: the case of the Netherlands – Dams – Adaptation and the non structural approach

3 Conflict and Cooperation Water wars? – Public ownership – Benefits of cooperation – Treaties and agreements – Beyond the treaty

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viPOISONED SPRING

4 It Never Rains But it Pours: Climate Change, Water Shortage and Flood Water quality – Increased costs – North and south – Supplyside measures – Reducing waste – Reducing demand from agriculture – Tackling climate change

5 The European Union Within its Borders: Why Privatisation? The Ideology Behind the Theft of Public Property How ideology becomes practice: the EU legal framework and the drive to privatisation – EU finance – Some experiences of privatisation in the EU – The picture in the rest of the EU – Conclusion

6 European Union Within its Borders, Part 2: The Water Framework Directive Drought and water scarcity – Flood – What should be done?

7 The European Union Beyond its Borders The ideological front – Public–Private Infrastructure Advisory Facility (PPIAF) – BizClim and the Private Sector Enabling Environment Facility – Public alternatives

8 A Better Water Policy is Possible

Bibliography Books – Official, academic, trade union and NGO reports – Papers, articles, pamphlets and presentations

Notes Index

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The authors have had the kind assistance of many individuals in preparing this book. We would like in particular to thank those people who gave up their usually highlypressured time to allow us to interview them: Olivier Hoedeman of Corporate Europe Observatory; Hans Blokland, MEP for the Dutch political party the Christian Union; Carolina Falk, Assistant General Secretary of the United European Left/Nordic Green Left group of Euro MPs, who was responsible for coordinating her group’s response to the Water Framework Directive during its course through the European Parliament; David Hall of the Public Service International Research Unit and indeed all of his colleagues. Without PSIRU’s detailed, meticulous research, this book could not have been written in its present form. Thanks also to others we interviewed: Sergiy Moroz of WWF’s European Policy Office; Pieter de Pous of the European Environmental Bureau; Paulus Jansen, Member of the Dutch national parliament and spokesman on water issues for the Socialist Party; and finally all of the people with whom we have chatted at the numerous conferences and other events which we have attended, many of whom have offered valuable advice and information. We would also like to thank colleagues who have been helpful, particularly Kartika Liotard’s policy assistant Thomas Gijselaers, and Audrey Wang, who typed up the interviews and much other material.

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ACRONYMS AND ABBREVIATIONS

ACP Africa Caribbean Pacific ACU Alternative Conjunctive Use AquaFed International Federation of Private Water Operators BAR Basins at Risk BizClim Business Climate facility BWR Basic Water Requirement CAP Common Agricultural Policy CCFD ComitÉ Catholique contre la Faim et pour le DÉvÉloppement CEO Corporate Europe Observatory CIS Common Implementation Strategy DGCompetition European Commission DirectorateGeneral for Competition DGDev DirectorateGeneral for Development DGEnvi DirectorateGeneral for Environment DG Markt DirectorateGeneral for Internal Market and Services EBRD European Bank for Reconstruction and Development ECPUTW Economic Commission for Europe’s Convention on the Protection and Use of Transboundary Watercourses and International Lakes EEA European Environmental Agency EEB European Environmental Bureau EPAs Economic Partnership Agreements EPWN European Public Water Network EUWI European Union Water Initiative GATS General Agreement on Trade in Services HDR Human Development Report

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IFIs IISD

IMF IMPEL IPCC ISPA

l/p/d MDG NGO OECD

PPIAF

PPP PSEEF PSIRU PUP RSPB RWA SAMI SIWI SNHP SOE TNC UNDESA

UNECE UNEP UNICE

WCD WEF WFD WISE

ACRONYMS AND ABBREVIATIONS ix

International Financial Institutions International Institute for Sustainable Development International Monetary Fund Network for Environmental Inspection Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Instrument for Structural Policy for pre Accession Litres per day Millennium Development Goal NonGovernmental Organisation Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development Public–Private Infrastructure Advisory Facility Public–Private Partnerships Private Sector Enabling Environment Facility Public Services International Research Unit Public–Public Partnership Royal Society for the Protection of Birds Regional Water Authority South Australia Murray Irrigators Stockholm International Water Institute Spanish National Hydrological Plan State Owned Enterprises Transnational Corporation United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs UN Economic Commission for Europe United Nations Environmental Programme Union of Industrial and Employers’ Confederations of Europe (known since 2007 as Business Europe) World Commission on Dams World Economic Forum Water Framework Directive Water Information System for Europe