In one of my previous articles, I addressed the concept of social resilience or social ingenuity, developed by Homer-Dixon (1995) and Ohlsson (1998). If Qatar was able to know how to use its comparative advantage, it is not the same for other societies less resilient. Today I will make an overview of violence related to water due to the fact that the country was not resilient enough.
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| ( United Nations, 2013) |
On July, 6th 2000, thousands of North China Plain farmers have violently clashed with police. Their anger was the result of a government project that arbitration allocating water tanks of some cities and industries rather than meeting the needs for irrigation (Postel and Wolf, 2001) The same month, farmers attacked the construction of a dam rehabilitation: them of it leaks allowed to cultivate their parched lands (Brown, 2000)
In April 2001, violent protests erupted in Karachi. The tensions are more and more rising between Pakistani provinces of Punjab and Sindh on sharing the waters of the Indus (Sawaal News, 2001). These rivalries between the two provinces of Pakistan, are related with water management in the basin. But also accelerated degradation by salinization of agricultural land in Pakistan, does not bode good for the stability of a fragile state facing a growing Islamist opposition.
In Darfur, the drying of the region highlighted the competition between sedentary farmers and herders, stirring the seeds of the current conflict began in 2003 and exploited by others and the central government in Khartoum. The Organization of African Unity recognized the important role of conflict over access to water in the outbreak of civil war.
From the examination of these conflicts, ancient or modern, it appears that tensions are favoured when the way to use water overlaps of ethnic differences and / or religious.
[ Want to Know More? ]
Sandra Postel et Aaron Wolf, « Dehydrating Conflict », Foreign Policy, septembre-octobre 2001, version Internet.
Sawaal News, 19 avril 2001, hhttp:// news. sawaal. com/ 19-Apr-2001/ International/ 41. htm,document consulté le 28 novembre 2001.
This is definitely a negative and inevitable consequence of water scarcity, however, an article last week highlighted an interesting point, that temperature is a greater driver of conflict in Sub Saharan Africa than water levels. Have a read! http://www.circleofblue.org/waternews/2014/world/report-water-plays-little-role-sub-sahara-africa-conflicts/
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