IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v17y2025i4p1588-d1591502.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Exploring the Socio-Environmental Regulation of Water—A Systematic Review of Sustainable Watershed Management

Author

Listed:
  • Felipe Sáez-Ardura

    (Vicerrectoría de Investigación y Postgrado, Universidad de La Frontera, Temuco 4811230, Chile)

  • Matías Parra-Salazar

    (Facultad de Medicina y Ciencias de La Salud, Universidad Mayor, Temuco 4780000, Chile)

  • Arturo Vallejos-Romero

    (Departamento de Ciencias Sociales, Universidad de La Frontera, Temuco 4811230, Chile)

  • Ignacio Rodríguez-Rodríguez

    (Departamento de Ciencias Sociales, Universidad de La Frontera, Temuco 4811230, Chile)

  • Minerva Cordoves-Sánchez

    (Vicerrectoría de Investigación y Postgrado, Universidad de La Frontera, Temuco 4811230, Chile)

  • César Cisternas-Irarrázabal

    (Núcleo Científico Tecnológico en Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades, Universidad de La Frontera, Temuco 4811230, Chile)

  • Loreto Arias-Lagos

    (Departamento de Ciencias Sociales, Universidad de La Frontera, Temuco 4811230, Chile)

  • Jaime Garrido-Castillo

    (Departamento de Ciencias Sociales, Universidad de La Frontera, Temuco 4811230, Chile)

  • Pablo Aznar-Crespo

    (Departamento de Sociologia, Universidad de Alicante, 03690 San Vicente del Raspeig, Spain)

  • Vinicius Genaro

    (Centro de Ciências Biológicas e da Saúde (CCBS), Universidade Federal do Maranhão, São Luís 65080-805, Brazil)

Abstract

This article presents a systematic review of sustainable watershed management at the international level. Based on the risk regulation approach, this review approaches the specific gaps in the literature related to relevant issues outlining the international freshwater resources socio-environmental regulation issue, especially in regards to its sociological dimensions: the organizational capabilities of agents involved in regulatory efforts, issue-implicit challenges, and regulatory effort-generated socio-environmental risks. The study identifies the reflexive components of the involved institutions, outlines the deployment of organizational processes in normative regulatory components, and explores the modalities for addressing change and complexity in the regulatory field. A corpus of 64 articles published in the Web of Science (WoS) and Scopus databases between 2021 and 2024 was analyzed, and the following findings are demonstrated: (1) regulatory requirements emerge across the three dimensions due to sociological factors, with the need for broad-ranging coordination capacities and socio-technical improvements highlighted, (2) while high political–technical capacities are exhibited by regulatory agents in the field of study, significant regulatory challenges persist, complicating the sustainable management of watersheds, and (3) decision-making based on socio-environmental risks is deemed feasible within the field of study, enabling advancements in techno-scientific and socio-political areas, although achieving this is considered challenging. It is concluded that sustainable watershed management can be better understood when the risk-based approach is used as an explanatory framework, particularly in priority areas for addressing—and regulating—the global and local dilemmas involved in governing water resources. As this field has been scarcely examined from this perspective, a series of potential research avenues with substantial scope are faced by the social sciences. Socio-environmental challenges related to water should be rigorously analyzed in future studies through innovative approaches, with the social components of the issue prioritized.

Suggested Citation

  • Felipe Sáez-Ardura & Matías Parra-Salazar & Arturo Vallejos-Romero & Ignacio Rodríguez-Rodríguez & Minerva Cordoves-Sánchez & César Cisternas-Irarrázabal & Loreto Arias-Lagos & Jaime Garrido-Castillo , 2025. "Exploring the Socio-Environmental Regulation of Water—A Systematic Review of Sustainable Watershed Management," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 17(4), pages 1-24, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:17:y:2025:i:4:p:1588-:d:1591502
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/17/4/1588/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/17/4/1588/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Samira Shayanmehr & Jana Ivanič Porhajašová & Mária Babošová & Mahmood Sabouhi Sabouni & Hosein Mohammadi & Shida Rastegari Henneberry & Naser Shahnoushi Foroushani, 2022. "The Impacts of Climate Change on Water Resources and Crop Production in an Arid Region," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 12(7), pages 1-22, July.
    2. Khawar Naeem & Adel Zghibi & Adel Elomri & Annamaria Mazzoni & Chefi Triki, 2023. "A Literature Review on System Dynamics Modeling for Sustainable Management of Water Supply and Demand," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(8), pages 1-24, April.
    3. Haibo Du & Xuepeng Ji & Xiaowei Chuai, 2022. "Spatial Differentiation and Influencing Factors of Water Pollution-Intensive Industries in the Yellow River Basin, China," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(1), pages 1-16, January.
    4. Di Zhu & Chang Liu & Yong Dong & Junguo Hua, 2022. "The Effect of Environmental Regulation on Corporate Environmental Governance Behavior and Its Mechanisms," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(15), pages 1-18, July.
    5. Christopher A. Freimund & Gregg M. Garfin & Laura M. Norman & Larry A. Fisher & James L. Buizer, 2022. "Flood resilience in paired US–Mexico border cities: a study of binational risk perceptions," Natural Hazards: Journal of the International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, Springer;International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, vol. 112(2), pages 1247-1271, June.
    6. Bunga Ludmila Rendrarpoetri & Ernan Rustiadi & Akhmad Fauzi & Andrea Emma Pravitasari, 2024. "Sustainability Assessment of the Upstream Bengawan Solo Watershed in Wonogiri Regency, Central Java Province, Indonesia," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(5), pages 1-29, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Dengpan Xiao & Wenjiao Shi, 2023. "Modeling the Adaptation of Agricultural Production to Climate Change," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 13(2), pages 1-4, February.
    2. Dandan Zhu & Xinping Tao & Meibo Huang, 2023. "Law Reinforcement, Production Pattern and Enterprise Environmental Performance: Evidence from Environmental Courts in China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(5), pages 1-20, March.
    3. Razzaq, Asif & Sharif, Arshian & Ozturk, Ilhan & Yang, Xiaodong, 2023. "Central inspections of environmental protection and transition for low-carbon Chinese cities: Policy intervention and mechanism analysis," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 124(C).
    4. Yong Ma & Chunyu Li, 2023. "Optimal Strategies of Customization and Information Sharing in the Presence of Feature Creep," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(10), pages 1-29, May.
    5. Bunga Ludmila Rendrarpoetri & Ernan Rustadi & Akhmad Fauzi & Andrea Emma Pravitasari, 2024. "Local Sustainability Assessment of the Wonogiri Multipurpose Reservoir Catchment Area in Central Java Province, Indonesia," Land, MDPI, vol. 13(11), pages 1-28, November.
    6. Samed Ozdemir & Zeynep Akbulut & Fevzi Karsli & Taskin Kavzoglu, 2024. "Extraction of Water Bodies from High-Resolution Aerial and Satellite Images Using Visual Foundation Models," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(7), pages 1-23, April.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:17:y:2025:i:4:p:1588-:d:1591502. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.