A River Flows Through It: A Comparative Study of Transboundary Water Disputes and Cooperation in Asia explores water disputes in Asia and addresses the question of how states sharing a river system can be incentivized to cooperate. Water scarcity is a major environmental, societal, and economic problem around the world. Increasing demand for water as a result of rapid economic development, high population growth and density has depleted the world’s water resources, leading to floods, droughts, environmental disasters, and societal displacement. Shared river basins are therefore often a source of tension and conflict between states. In regions where relations between countries have historically been conflictual, scarce river water resources have exacerbated tensions and have even sparked wars. Yet, more often than not, states sharing a river basin are able to come to some form of agreement, whether they are far-reaching ones such as water-sharing agreements or those that are more limited such as the sharing of hydrological data. Why do riparian states cooperate, especially when power asymmetries between upstream and downstream countries are characteristic of transboundary river basins? How do non-state actors affect the management of international rivers? What are the conditions that facilitate or hinder cooperation? This book wrestles with these questions by exploring water disputes and cooperation in the major river systems in Asia, and by comparing them with cases in Africa, Europe, and the United States. This book will be of great value to scholars, students, and policymakers interested in transboundary water disputes and cooperation, hydro-diplomacy, and river activism. It was originally published as special issues of Water International.

John Wesley Powell, U.S. scientist and geographer, put it best when he said that a watershed is: ...that area of land, a bounded hydrologic system, within which all living things are inextricably linked by their common water course and where, as humans settled, simple logic demanded that they become part of a community. Watersheds come in all shapes and sizes. They cross sectorial boundaries (e.g. county, state/province, and country). No matter where you are, you are in a watershed! World-wide, watersheds supply drinking water, provide r- reation and respite, and sustain life. Watersheds are rich in natural capital, producing goods (agriculture and fisheries products) and services (industry and technology) for broad geographic areas. In many countries, at the base of watersheds where tributaries empty into large water-bodies (e.g. estuaries, seas, oceans) are centers of society and are typically densely populated areas. These areas serve as concentrated centers of the socio-economic system. They also are centers of domestic and international trade, tourism, and c- merce as well as the center of governments (capitals) where local, regional and national legislatures are located. As we all live in a watershed, our individual actions can directly affect it. The cumulative effects of all the individual actions of everyone within a watershed may be, and often are devastating to the quality of water resources and affect the health of living things including humans. Therefore, watershed systems are highly subject to threat to human security and peace.

This book provides a comprehensive overview of emerging challenges facing different social groups, policy-makers and the international community related to economic growth, social development and environmental change, social inclusion and regional development. The book undertakes a critical assessment of the tensions associated with the failures of mainstream regulatory approaches and impacts of social and economic policies whilst widening the discussion on the interface between the expansion of the socio-environmental demands, equity and justice. These are crucial challenges, of great importance today and of equal relevance to the Global North and South. The book explores one of the main contradictions of development, the simplification of assessments and narrow consideration of alternatives. Taking this dilemma as its departure point, it goes on to examine the justification, trends and limitations of Western-based development and possible alternatives to fundamentally modify the basis and the rationale of the development process. It considers theoretical and lived experiences of development, paying attention to multiple scales, local realities and economic frontiers. Contributing authors explore policy recommendations and discuss effective practical tools for determining the values different people hold for ecosystem services and territorial resources. They cover the monitoring of change in the provision of ecosystem services that might increase the well-being of vulnerable groups as well as strategies to promote innovation and integrated, equitable and sustainable development.

This book documents and compares the experiences of a wide range of universities across the five continents with regard to sustainable development, making it of special interest to sustainability researchers and practitioners. By showcasing how integrative approaches to sustainable development at the university level can be successfully employed to bridge the gaps between disciplines, the book provides a timely contribution to the literature on sustainability and offers a valuable resource for all those interested in sustainability in a higher education context.