scholarly journals Polycentric Solutions for Groundwater Governance in Sub-Saharan Africa: Encouraging Institutional Artisanship in an Extended Ladder of Participation

Water ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (5) ◽  
pp. 630
Author(s):  
Bryan Bruns
Keyword(s):  
Collective Action ◽  
Water Governance ◽  
Groundwater Development ◽  
Political Support ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Domestic Water ◽  
Aquifer Management ◽  
Diverse Range ◽  
Groundwater Governance ◽  
Groundwater Irrigation

The growth of groundwater irrigation poses opportunities and challenges, particularly in Africa where substantial potential exists for increased groundwater irrigation but has been constrained by limited access to energy, technology for pumps and drilling, markets, and other factors. Conventional groundwater governance concepts for state-led regulation or co-management are problematic for conditions where state capacity or political support for regulation to reconcile conflicting interests is limited. Experience in Africa and elsewhere does offer examples that may help recognize feasible patterns for collective action that can influence the equity, efficiency, and sustainability of groundwater development. An extended ladder of participation helps look beyond state-led water governance and co-management to a more diverse range of opportunities for supporting local autonomy and initiative to expand opportunities and solve problems in groundwater development. Collective action in groundwater governance can include well spacing; sharing of wells, pumps, and pipes; protecting domestic water sources; crop coordination; groundwater recharge; water imports; and aquifer management. Even where non-state organizations and collective action play primary roles in water governance, they may still be empowered by, receive advice from, or share information with government agencies and other actors. Polycentric groundwater governance can be supported by improving information, facilitating cooperation, endorsing standards, providing a legal framework for resolving conflicts and constituting governance agreements, and through polycentric social learning. Polycentric institutional artisanship by water users and their organizations can help find feasible solutions for improving groundwater governance.

scholarly journals Replumbing the Bengal Basin: A Shift in Recharge Driven by Groundwater Irrigation Revealed by Stable Water Isotopes

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yusuf Jameel ◽  
Mason Stahl ◽  
Holly Michael ◽  
Benjamin Bostick ◽  
Mike Steckler ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Bengal Basin ◽  
Stable Water Isotopes ◽  
Domestic Water ◽  
Irrigated Rice ◽  
Standing Water ◽  
Relative Contribution ◽  
Groundwater Irrigation ◽  
Direct Infiltration ◽  
Hydrologic System ◽  
Water Isotope

Abstract Groundwater supports agriculture and provides domestic water for over 250 million people in the Bengal Basin. Our analysis of stable water isotope ratios in rain, surface, and groundwater shows that the proportion of groundwater recharge originating from stagnant surface water bodies has increased by about 50% over the last seventy years while the relative contribution from direct infiltration of rain has decreased. This regional shift in the source of groundwater shows how the simultaneous expansion of irrigated rice, excavated ponds and groundwater pumping has changed the hydrologic system by cycling evaporated standing water through the subsurface. Analysis of water isotope data also reveals that most recharge from standing water enters during the latter part of the dry season (February-April), while most rainwater recharge occurs in the early months of the monsoon (June-August) before aquifers fill to capacity and reject additional recharge of rainwater.

Smallholder groundwater irrigation in sub-Saharan Africa: an interdisciplinary framework applied to the Usangu plains, Tanzania

2013 ◽  
Vol 21 (7) ◽  
pp. 1481-1495 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karen G. Villholth ◽  
Jegan Ganeshamoorthy ◽  
Christian M. Rundblad ◽  
Theis S. Knudsen
Keyword(s):  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Groundwater Irrigation ◽  
Interdisciplinary Framework ◽  
Sub Saharan

Understanding the Weak Performance of Technology in Urban Management

2016 ◽  
pp. 928-947
Author(s):  
Claire Simonneau
Keyword(s):  
New Technologies ◽  
Local Level ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
Political Support ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Urban Management ◽  
Management Tools ◽  
Multiple Case ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
Land Information System

The article questions the appropriation of existing urban planning and management tools in Sub-Saharan Africa, through a multiple case study: the implementation of a land information system (or simplified cadastre) in three cities in Benin. An ethnographic exploration of the use of the tool is conducted. The first section presents the historical context of the design of land information systems, framed by the urban management paradigm, and unwarranted confidence in new technologies. The second section presents the theoretical framework and the methodology of the research, inspired by public policy analysis and development anthropology. The third section describes findings of the multiple case studies. A vicious circle is highlighted, made up of: lack of political support, obsolescence, and decline of cost-effectiveness. The fourth section discusses the results of the ethnographic inquiry. These are, essentially, the interpretation of the paradoxes, blockages, and conflicts in the implementation of the tool in light of social, political and economic dynamics that take place at the local level, although unexpected by the creators of the tool.

scholarly journals Addressing gender inequality: Stumbling blocks and roads ahead

2018 ◽  
Vol 21 (5) ◽  
pp. 671-677 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thekla Morgenroth ◽  
Michelle K. Ryan
Keyword(s):  
Collective Action ◽  
Gender Equality ◽  
Gender Inequality ◽  
Parental Leave ◽  
Government Policies ◽  
Workplace Diversity ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Diverse Range ◽  
Gender Research

Despite many positive changes in terms of gender equality in recent decades, women remain underrepresented in positions of power and prestige, and continue to shoulder disproportionate amounts of unpaid domestic labor. This special issue brings together an examination of the different ways in which gender inequality can be addressed, the efficacy of such approaches, and the consequences these approaches can have. In this introduction to the special issue, we discuss the focus of past and present gender research and outline issues which have received less attention. We further give an overview of the papers in this special issue, which focus on a diverse range of ways in which gender inequality can be addressed, such as collective action, workplace diversity initiatives and parental leave policies, gender-fair language, and government policies. Taken together, these papers illustrate (a) the importance of ensuring that initiatives are evidence-based, (b) the ways in which we can maximize the effectiveness of interventions, and (c) the need to understand when these initiatives may inadvertently backfire.

scholarly journals Sexual and Reproductive Health Needs of Adolescent Girls and Young Women in Sub-Saharan Africa: Research, Policy, and Practice

SAGE Open ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 215824401985995 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kammila Naidoo ◽  
Oluwafemi Adeagbo ◽  
Melanie Pleaner
Keyword(s):  
Reproductive Health ◽  
Adolescent Girls ◽  
Young Women ◽  
Sexual And Reproductive Health ◽  
Research Policy ◽  
Good Health ◽  
Health Needs ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Gender Based Violence ◽  
Diverse Range

Seventeen articles make up this special collection, covering a range of different, but cross-cutting themes. These highlight contemporary concerns in African research and scholarship about the factors configuring the sexual and reproductive health needs of adolescent girls and young women (AGYW). The articles interrogate contextual and cultural impediments, problematic representations, perceptions of vulnerabilities and rights, experiences of gender-based violence, coercive sex, unplanned motherhood—and agency, resistance and strategic interventions. While a diverse range of issues, theories, and methodologies are evident, all the articles reflect on how the circumstances of young women in Africa can be effectively improved to engender empowerment, good health, and personal and sexual autonomy.

scholarly journals Farmer-Led Irrigation and Its Impacts on Smallholder Farmers’ Crop Income: Evidence from Southern Tanzania

2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (5) ◽  
pp. 1512
Author(s):  
Maurice Osewe ◽  
Aijun Liu ◽  
Tim Njagi
Keyword(s):  
Smallholder Farmers ◽  
Household Head ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Household Welfare ◽  
Domestic Water ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Water Users ◽  
Per Capita ◽  
The Government ◽  
Crop Income

Irrigation projects in sub-Saharan Africa are mostly unsustainable because of lack of maintenance by their users or government planners. By contrast, evidence shows that the smallholder farmers are developing and expanding the irrigated land, using their initiatives. Farmer-led irrigation, a revolutionary agricultural intensification approach, is already in progress with the magnitude to significantly transform the living standards of smallholder farmers. However, a rigorous assessment of its impact on household welfare to ascertain this is lacking. This paper bridges this gap by assessing factors influencing the adoption of this particular approach as well as its effects on the farmers’ per capita net crop income. Our data set consists of 608 smallholder farmers in Southern Tanzania and used propensity score matching to estimate the effects of adoption on the per capita net crop income. Our results indicate that the uptake of farmer-led irrigation practices is influenced by drought experience, water user group membership, farmer organization membership, and government extension, as well as the sex of the household head. Further, there was a positive and significant effect on the adopters’ per capita net crop income, thus encouraging the need to promote farmer-led irrigation as a complement to externally promoted innovations in achieving sustainable food security. This study, therefore, recommends that the government should support the farmers’ initiative by improving roads, removing market barriers, and helping farmers who have not yet taken up the initiative. Also, the government should enact regulations to make sure farmer-led irrigation initiatives do not harm the eco-environment such as protecting domestic water users. Finally, the government should leverage microservices to the farmers such as promoting affordable and appropriate credit facilities. It is necessary to continue pursuing this vein of research to gain information regarding the definite impact of the farmer-led irrigation on household welfare.

Distributional Coalitions and the Politics of Economic Reform in Latin America

1999 ◽  
Vol 51 (2) ◽  
pp. 236-268 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hector E. Schamis
Keyword(s):  
Collective Action ◽  
Latin American ◽  
Economic Reform ◽  
Explanatory Power ◽  
Political Support ◽  
Closed Economy ◽  
Economic Adjustment ◽  
American Experience ◽  
Main Variable ◽  
Seeking Behavior

For much of the discipline of economics, a closed economy is seen as the result of efforts of distributional coalitions and rent seekers to maintain sector-specific protections. Accordingly, economic liberalization is explained by the policy consistency of uncompromising reform elites. Students of the politics of economic adjustment in the developing world, in turn, have argued that reform programs concentrate costs in the present and disperse benefits in the future. Hence, losers are prepared to engage in collective action, whereas prospective winners, facing uncertainty about payoffs, remain disorganized. They thus posit the cohesiveness and insularity of policymakers as the main variable for explaining successful reform. Both economists and political scientists, therefore, adopt a collective action approach that overlooks how groups organizein supportof liberalization.In the recent Latin American experience, however, these reforms have preserved market reserves for firms that provided vital political support to, and often colluded with, policymaking elites. This setting has thus reproduced incentives for rent-seeking behavior, even in the presence of comprehensive liberalization. This evidence supports two interrelated theoretical claims. First, distributional coalitions may proliferate when the state withdraws from the economy, not only when it intervenes. Second, interest-based variables retain explanatory power in political economy—which state autonomy arguments disregard—irrespective of whether the economy is closed or open—which neoclassical perspectives overlook. To highlight the centrality of interest groups favoring marketization, therefore, the article suggests modifications to the dominant theories of collective action and the literature on the politics of economic adjustment.

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