Roles, Rights, and Responsibilities in Water Governance

Numerous commentators have highlighted the criticality of improving water governance to help address current and future water challenges. But whose job is it? In water governance, what should we expect from our governments? What should commercial water users expect from each other? What changes should environmental and social advocates expect as a result of their representations on behalf of stakeholders who have little or no voice? And what should governments expect from the communities they serve? This article briefly examines the rights and responsibilities of various actors in water governance through a selection of key water issues. We suggest that discussions about water are often unbalanced, overemphasizing the rights of large water users and underemphasizing the responsibilities all parties have toward achieving effective and efficient water governance. Among all the responsibilities in water governance, none is more fundamental than our shared responsibility toward intergenerational equity. This shared responsibility can and should be the rallying point around which we gather to improve water decisions at all scales, from local streams to national policies and global agreements.