Workshop Chair: Thomas Bernauer, Professor Ariel Dinar, Senior Researcher Halvard Buhaug
Location: Rosedown Room, New Orleans Hilton Riverside
Time: Tuesday, February 16, 9:00 AM – 6:00 PM
Workshop Summary:
Water is an intrinsic aspect of humanity. It is essential for consumption, food production, communication and transportation, energy production, sanitation and health. Climate change, population growth, and shifting consumption patterns are contributing to rapidly increasing pressure on shared water resources in many parts of the world. While alarmist projections of major water wars so far seem unfounded – in fact, cooperation, not conflict, seems to be the norm – history is not short on disputes over water access and use. To what extent do water shortages, asymmetric accessibility, pollution, and lack of proper management constitute a threat to national and human security? Under what contexts are water treaties successful and when do they fail? And what are the mechanisms that could translate water scarcities into organized violence and armed conflict? These are some of the questions that will be discussed during the workshop.
This workshop will bring together young and experienced researchers in the field with strong skills in the application of quantitative methods to global or regional datasets. Two broad themes will be covered. A majority of the accepted papers deals with international dimensions of water security, studying institutional means of cooperation, coordination, and management, river treaties, and contentious issues. Particular emphasis is placed on the developing world, whose waters are often less well managed and whose natural and societal environments are perceived more vulnerable to future changes. The second group of papers emerges from the environmental security debate and studies implications of water variability and scarcity for social instability and armed conflict. A significant contribution of these papers will be the explicit focus on local dynamics, using highly disaggregated data and GIS-based research designs on new geo-referenced dataset on rainfall, water accessibility, and local armed conflict.
Through this workshop, we seek to establish a constructive environment for closer collaboration between participating individuals and institutions that will spur new research directions and stimulate joint research projects and publications on this most important research topic.
Workshop Participants:
- Andrea Gerlak, University of Arizona, USA
- Anna Kalbhenn, ETH Zurich, Switzerland
- Ariel Dinar, University of California, Riverside, USA
- Brian Blankespoor, World Bank USA
- Cullen Hendrix, University of North Texas, USA
- Douglas M. Stinnett, University of Georgia, USA
- Erika Weinthal, Duke University, USA
- Halvard Buhaug, PRIO, Norway
- Helge Holtermann, PRIO, Norway
- Idean Salehyan, University of North Texas, USA
- Jaroslav Tir, University of Georgia, USA
- Jeannie Sowers, Harvard University, USA
- Jonathan Lautze, Tufts University, USA
- Marit Brochmann, University of Oslo & PRIO, Norway
- Mark Giordano, Int’l Water Management Institute, Sri Lanka
- Michael M. Bechtel, ETH Zurich, Switzerland
- Neda A. Zawahri, Cleveland State University, USA
- Nita Rudra, University of Pittsburgh, USA
- Ole Magnus Theisen, Norw. U. of Science & Technology, Norway
- Paul R. Hensel, University of North Texas, USA
- Pradeep Kurukulasuriya, UNDP, USA
- Shlomi Dinar, Florida International University, USA
- Thomas Bernauer, ETH Zurich, Switzerland
- Vally Koubi, University of Bern, Switzerland
