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China's Water Scarcity and ItsImplications for Domestic andInternational StabilityTodd Hofstedt aa U.S. Navy

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To cite this article: Todd Hofstedt (2010): China's Water Scarcity and Its Implicationsfor Domestic and International Stability, Asian Affairs: An American Review, 37:2,71-83

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Asian Affairs: An American Review, 37:71–83, 2010ISSN: 0092-7678 printDOI: 10.1080/00927671003791389

China’s Water Scarcity and ItsImplications for Domestic andInternational Stability

TODD HOFSTEDT

Abstract: This article is based on a review of current literature to ascertain rela-tionships among water scarcity, economic growth, and social stability in China,with particular emphasis on identifying any mechanisms by which China’s waterscarcity could lead to political instability. First, the author examines the magni-tude and extent of water scarcity and distribution issues in China, including currenttrends with respect to water usage and availability and the resulting economic im-pacts, highlighting the ultimate necessity of an effective government response.He then assesses current government policies and determines them to be inade-quate to alleviate water scarcity, while at the same time, such policies engenderantagonism between different regions within China. Finally, the author examinesthe social, economic, and political consequences of some of the most commonand obvious policy prescriptions for addressing water scarcity issues. From thisemerge numerous potential mechanisms by which these policies could threatendomestic stability if implemented in the political and economic context of China,as well as several factors that point to the likelihood of China’s leaders channelingpopular frustration externally, to the detriment of both regional stability and greatpower relations. China’s water scarcity issue thus not only poses a significant

Address correspondence to Todd Hofstedt, 499 Crosswind Drive, Fernandina Beach, FL32034, USA. E-mail: tahofstedt@msn.com

The views presented in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflectthe views of the U.S. Navy or the government of the United States. This article not subjectto U.S. copyright law.

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resource management challenge but also carries potentially serious ramificationsfor international peace and security.

Keywords: China, stability, water

With more than 20 percent of the world’s population but less than 7 percent ofits freshwater resources, China is increasingly facing issues associated with

the scarcity of water.1 This problem is particularly acute in northern China, wherewater use substantially exceeds sustainable quantities and demand continues togrow. Given the mounting severity of the current water scarcity issues afflictingnorthern China, government action is required to mitigate further deterioration ofthe situation—and, indeed, the Chinese government is taking action to addresssome of these issues. However, although many alarmist fears of scarcity-inducedconflict prove unwarranted, as economic price signals and government policiesallow the society to adapt to changing conditions, in the case of China, those veryadaptations could potentially prove more destabilizing than the scarcity itself.

Government-imposed measures to provide an effective long-term solution po-tentially jeopardize the sustained high gross domestic product (GDP) growth ratesthe Chinese Communist Party (CCP) views as instrumental to maintaining itslegitimacy.2 Even policy alternatives more conducive to economic growth riskgenerating other forms of social upheaval, including regional or sectoral tensions.Nationalism—whether intentionally fostered by the CCP to unify conflicting or ag-grieved domestic elements behind the national government, or reluctantly adoptedby the CCP to co-opt a reactionary backlash by elements favoring a return togreater centralized control over the economy and insularity from the vagaries ofglobal market forces—could transform Chinese domestic tension into regional, oreven global, tension. Consequently, the Chinese government’s response to waterscarcity issues over the next few decades will have a critical impact on regionalsecurity in South and Southeast Asia, as well as implications for its long-termrelationship with the United States.

Current Water Scarcity Issues

Of its 668 largest cities, the Chinese government has classified 300 of them asshort of water, with 108 identified as “serious” and 60 “critical.”3 The annual urbanfreshwater shortage is estimated at 5–6 billion m3, and urban demand continues togrow at 10.1 percent annually.4 With irrigated areas already experiencing shortagesof 30–35 billion m3 annually and industrial demand growing at 5.4 percent annu-ally, China’s water scarcity problem is severe and worsening.5 Water levels in rivershave dropped to the point that they caused power outages, as hydroelectric plantslacked sufficient flow for electricity generation, and economic losses attributableto water shortages in the urban areas of northern China alone are assessed bythe Chinese Academy of Sciences as equivalent to 3 percent of the total Chinese

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GDP.6 The Chinese government predicts that by 2030, China’s annual freshwatershortage will reach 200 billion m3, exceeding its current annual consumption.7

With China’s available water largely concentrated in the south, northern Chinafaces particularly severe freshwater scarcity issues. Northern China encompasses42 percent of the population (538 million people) and 40 percent of China’s cul-tivated land. It also produces 31 percent of the GDP but has only 14 percent ofChina’s fresh water.8 The United Nations (UN) and World Bank define water stressas annual per capita water availability of 2,000 m3 or less and water scarcity as1,000 m3 or less.9 By comparison, per capita availability in the Hai River basinis only 343 m3.10 This extreme scarcity has led to the mining of aquifers, an-nually extracting 8.8 billion m3 in excess of the recharge flow.11 Consequently,groundwater tables in the Hai plains have dropped as much as 90 m, those un-der Beijing have dropped 100–300 m, and water tables continue to drop about1.5 m per year.12 Beyond requiring deeper wells, shrinking water tables have ledto salt water intrusion in coastal areas, affecting seventy-two locations over an areaof 142 km2.13 This degrades agricultural productivity and effectively reduces avail-able water supplies even further by requiring expensive desalinization of waterfrom previously productive wells. Shrinking water tables have even led to serioussubsidence.14 Beijing has sunk three-quarters of a meter over the past forty years,and continues to sink approximately two centimeters per year, while the centerof Shanghai has sunk almost two meters over the past forty years.15 Structuraldamage from subsidence was estimated at 1.14 billion yuan in 1985 alone.16

Given the growing magnitude of water scarcity and its associated issues acrossnorthern China, is there a risk of social unrest? Numerous studies of the impactof environmental scarcity on conflict have consistently demonstrated little or norelation between the two, and even where a positive correlation is established, themagnitude is very small relative to the other variables, particularly economic andpolitical factors.17 Some neo-Malthusian arguments identify the requirement for“important intervening variables between environmental scarcity and conflict,”including “decreased agricultural production, decreased economic activity, mi-gration, and weakened states.”18 Conversely, neoclassical economists argue thatsociety will adapt to scarcity through adjustment to the changing price signalsbrought on by increasing demand or decreasing supply.19 All of these results,while seemingly dispelling concern over the likelihood of scarcity-induced con-flict, actually bode very ill for long-term stability in China. For in the case of China,it is not in response to conditions of scarcity that conflict threatens; it is in responseto the economic consequences of government actions taken to address that scarcity.

Impact of Current Government Actions

With agriculture consuming 69 percent of China’s available fresh water, im-proving irrigation efficiency has received considerable attention.20 However, im-provements in this area have not only failed to relieve water scarcity but to some

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extent have made it worse. First, improved irrigation efficiency has not appreciablyreduced agricultural demand for water, as most of the water saved has simply beenused to increase the area under irrigation.21 Second, dramatic reduction in tra-ditional irrigation losses in the form of spillage and leakage has curbed flowsthat previously contributed to recharging aquifers, thereby significantly reducingaquifer recharge rates and thus the sustainable level of aquifer output.22 Finally,similar attempts to curb water losses caused by evaporation and transpiration, ifsuccessful, would reduce the atmospheric moisture that contributes to precipita-tion, thereby likely increasing demands on irrigation while reducing both riverflow and aquifer replenishment. Failing to consider the impact of policy decisionson the full hydrologic cycle thus merely shifts problems without providing anysort of long-term solution.

Given China’s penchant for public works projects and freshwater availability insouthern China averaging 3,208 m3 per person (compared with 757 m3 per personin northern China), it is not surprising that at least partial alleviation of watershortages is being sought in the form of a massive South-North Water DiversionProject.23 Three tunnels, each over 700 miles long, will divert water from the upper,middle, and lower reaches of the Yangtze River system in the south to points onthe Yellow River system in the north.24 When completed, they will transfer a totalof 38–48 billion m3 annually—5 percent of the total Yangtze River flow.25

Beyond concerns about the adequacy of such south-north flows to substantiallyrelieve water scarcity in northern China, it is unclear to what extent the Chinesegovernment has considered future changes to freshwater availability in southernChina. What is clear, however, is that barring a major shift in regional weatherpatterns that brings significantly greater moisture to the area, water supplies insouthern China will decrease in the future. The additional runoff from the shrinkingof Himalayan glaciers provides glacier-fed rivers with a flow that currently ex-ceeds that which is sustainable over the long-term. Moreover, all potential futuresultimately lead to reduced runoff: If the glaciers continue to shrink, eventually theywill be gone, and with them the contribution of river flow attributable to melting; ifthe glaciers stop shrinking, the effect on river flow would be equivalent to that in thecomplete loss of glacier case, since they will no longer be contributing melt water;if glacier shrinkage reverses, river flows will be proportionately less than those inthe previous two cases, as a portion of atmospheric moisture that would otherwisecontribute to river flow is retained by the expanding glacier. With water suppliesreduced by the loss of glacier runoff, increases in water demand in the south (fromeconomic growth, population growth, and improvements in living standards) couldcreate resentment or even hostility over continued water diversion to the north.26

Chinese administrative responses to water scarcity, primarily in the form ofcontrols and quotas, are mostly ineffective.27 The Ministry of Water Resourcesoperates river basin commissions, but they are largely ignored.28 Because “gov-ernment agencies of the same rank cannot issue binding orders to each other . . .

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a national ministry cannot issue a binding order to a provincial governor.”29 This,combined with the “national economic deal” in which “each level of governmentwill grant the level below it sufficient flexibility to enable the lower level to growits economy rapidly enough to maintain social and political stability,” encourageslocal officials to disregard limits and regulations that could impede local economicgrowth regardless of the consequences to neighboring or downstream regions.30

Impact of Potential Government Actions

Given the steadily deteriorating situation and the overall inadequacy of currentmeasures, more dramatic action is plainly necessary. However, this becomes prob-lematic for the Chinese government. Even if future demand growth does not over-whelm improvements in water use efficiency,31 the fact remains that current wateruse is unsustainably high, and therefore future water use must be reduced belowcurrent rates of consumption. Strict government allocation—and enforcement—ofwater between competing regions and between competing sectors of the economyrisks alienating some, if not all, of the parties involved and would be economicallyinefficient. Because resources would not be free to shift to where they wouldbe most productive, economic output would be less than economic potential.Furthermore, to the extent that additional regulation and limits increased manu-facturing costs, price competitiveness or profit (or both) would decrease, likelyslowing manufacturing growth and creating resentment on the part of the manufac-turing elite. The lower and middle classes would harbor grievances as well, as theslowing economy would hinder upward mobility and water use limits would curbthe attainment of modern Western living standards. To what extent this economicdissatisfaction would manifest itself in political instability is impossible to predict,but even if the economic grievances themselves were of insufficient magnitudeto spawn popular opposition to the government, widespread disaffection couldbe exploited by prodemocracy agitators. The fact that these economic grievancescould be specifically attributed to official government policy, coupled with broaddissatisfaction across large segments of society, could make the Chinese populaceparticularly supportive of those demanding popular control of government.

One readily available option for addressing at least a portion of the freshwaterscarcity while minimizing the impact on economic growth would be to abandonthe Chinese government objective of self-sufficiency in food (grain) production.32

This would allow available water to be employed in more economically productiveapplications while effectively increasing freshwater supplies through the impor-tation of “virtual water” in the form of food.33 However, this, too, is not withoutpotentially significant ramifications. First, declining agricultural production wouldcause an already large rural-to-urban migration to accelerate, likely generating re-sentment on the part of both new and current urban residents over diminishedeconomic opportunity and deteriorating living conditions. China already has one

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of the world’s highest rates of urbanization (4–5 percent annually through the1980s and 1990s, resulting in 150 million additional city dwellers every decade),and urban population growth that outpaces employment growth has been empiri-cally linked with domestic political violence.34 Continued stability in the face ofaccelerated urbanization would thus require continued rapid (if not accelerated)economic growth.

Second, reduced domestic production would increase the quantity of food de-manded on global markets, driving up global food prices.35 Fears of widespreadpopular discontent over higher food prices could force the Chinese governmentto take on the fiscal burden of subsidizing its population for these higher costs.Finally, with substantially larger imports of food—and those at higher prices—theChinese trade surplus would be reduced, at least temporarily.36 Although ulti-mately beneficial—and probably unavoidable—the imposition of such a policywould expose Chinese leaders to some risk during the transition period. A dimin-ished trade surplus, coupled with the abandonment of such a conservative nationalobjective as food self-sufficiency, could conceivably create a right-wing backlash,particularly in a context of lingering apprehension of strategic encirclement andvulnerability to foreign coercion. While the actual overthrow of the Chinese gov-ernment seems unlikely, such a backlash could facilitate the assumption of greaterpower by more conservative elements within the CCP or encourage existing lead-ers to adopt a more nationalistic stance to preclude any threat of ouster.

Although Chinese freshwater scarcity is substantially aggravated by rapid eco-nomic growth in a context of artificially low costs for fresh water, alleviationthrough market-based pricing of water would almost certainly be politically un-tenable.37 Currently, water prices range from 0.5–0.9 yuan per m3, despite themarginal cost of water projects exceeding 1.2 yuan per m3, with desalinationplants costing 4–7 yuan per m3 and the South-North Water Diversion Project an-ticipated to be 7–8 yuan per m3.38 Market pricing would thus require additionalprice increases of up to 1,500 percent—on top of other recent price increases—ina society culturally resistant to paying for water.39 Moreover, irrigation costs innorthern China represent 10 percent or more of nonlabor production costs forwheat and corn, compared with less than 2 percent in the United States, theEuropean Union, Canada, and Australia.40 The resulting jump in production costs,on top of rural incomes that are already less than one-third urban incomes andgrowing only half as fast,41 would risk a major rural backlash. If market forceswere also allowed to allocate this competitively priced water, the high fraction ofinput costs attributable to water, coupled with the relatively low economic produc-tivity of water in agriculture (e.g., 1,000 tons of water yields 1,600 yuan worth ofwheat or 112,000 yuan worth of manufactured goods),42 would virtually ensurethe collapse of the agricultural sector in China. In any case, urban dwellers wouldsee their quality of life plummet, as jumps in food and water prices led to anincrease in the cost of living, while massively accelerated migration from farms

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to cities led to overcrowding and intense competition for jobs. The higher cost ofwater as an input to the manufacturing process would reduce price competitive-ness or profit (or both), constricting manufacturing growth and further limitingeconomic opportunity. Because it adversely affects virtually all segments of thepopulation—and to such a significant degree—market pricing of water would al-most certainly be more threatening to the continued authority of the CCP than thewater scarcity problems it was intended to address.

Although frequently derided in the literature for over-predicting domestic po-litical violence,43 deprivation theory provides a model for potential instability inChina. The free-rider problem, and the lack of sufficient resources to have anyrational expectation of success, make the mass rebellion predicted by deprivationtheory far less prevalent than the elite coups predicted by rational choice theory.44

In the case of China, however, existing ethnic, regional, or even village groupscould resort to collective action, while “at least some deprivation theories . . . buildon the idea that frustration may lead to aggression, to some degree irrespective ofthe consequences of violence in terms of expected utilities.”45 This appears to beborne out to some extent already in China, which experienced 87,000 demonstra-tions against the government in 2005, an increase of 58 percent in two years.46

Alternatively, rational choice theory could explain violence instigated byChinese elites. Since both the highly educated and those with very high incomestend to have less trust in the Chinese government,47 perceived vulnerability ofthe Chinese government (such as fiscal weakness and widespread unpopularityfrom water scarcity abatement measures) could prompt prodemocracy groups orwealthy business interests to seize the opportunity to create change more con-ducive to their own best interests.48 Unsatisfied demand for social mobility byeducated youth has been empirically demonstrated to draw elite discontent andincrease the risk of domestic political violence.49 Potentially, a nationalist move-ment opposing the CCP for its failure to satisfy the needs and aspirations of theChinese people could draw the support of both the masses and the elites. Becausenationalism could be employed as a unifying force in rebellion (with a potencysecond only to religion),50 politically the CCP has almost no choice but to preemptany nationalist sentiment and channel it externally.

External Ramifications

There is a rich history of international cooperation with respect to shared wa-ter resources. Since the last war over water more than 4,500 years ago, therehave been more than 3,600 treaties concerning water issues, including about 300since 1814 specifically addressing non-navigational issues.51 In 1997, the UNGeneral Assembly adopted a convention governing non-navigational use of inter-national waterways.52 There are indications, however, that China may prove less

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accommodating than the historical norm. For example, China was one of onlythree countries to vote against the 1997 UN convention.53 Similarly, when Cam-bodia, Laos, Thailand, and Vietnam established the Mekong River Commissionin April 1995, China refused to sign the agreement.54 With three dams on theMekong already, and five more either planned or under construction (includingtwo that will be exceptionally massive),55 China has tremendous impact on thewater policy options of the Southeast Asian states, but lying upriver of all of them,China seems to have discounted the need for a multilateral approach to river use.56

The Mekong represents only a fraction of the potential leverage China couldexert over the region, however.57 Tibet is the ultimate source of major rivers intoChina, India, Pakistan, Bhutan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Cambodia, Laos,Thailand, and Vietnam, countries encompassing 47 percent of the world’s pop-ulation.58 Of all the major rivers originating in the Himalayas, only the Gangesoriginates outside Tibet.59 Several circumstances converge to significantly raise thefeasibility of China exploiting this potential leverage. First, such a stance providesan external outlet for any nationalist sentiment fostered to unite the country underCCP leadership. Second, action in this arena could directly address underlyingissues associated with water scarcity by providing additional freshwater resourceswith which to placate social and economic demands. Third, the Three Gorges Damand the South-North Water Diversion Project indicate a willingness to undertakewater redistribution projects on a massive scale, as well as provide experiencein constructing such works. Fourth, since almost all major regional watershedsoriginate in Chinese territory, their waters could be appropriated with no actualmilitary action required on the part of China. Any attempts by downstream coun-tries to physically resist unilaterally imposed flow diversions would necessitatetheir being the military aggressor. Finally, there is already a constituency of formerofficials advocating such a policy through a book entitled Tibet’s Waters Will SaveChina.60

In addition to potential regional tensions, nationalism could also manifest itselfin the form of strong anti-Americanism. Beyond the mere rivalry between an emer-gent global power and the reigning superpower, hostile sentiment could also arisefrom (or be amplified by) a sense of relative deprivation with respect to freshwaterresources. The Chinese per capita average of approximately 2,000 m3 (predictedto be down to 1,700 m3 by 2030) is dwarfed by the U.S. per capita average of10,332 m3.61 Moreover, the Chinese urban per capita use rate (230 liters per dayin 1997) will likely never reach the current U.S. rate of 400–700 liters per personper day.62 This perpetual inferiority of living standards—real or perceived—couldeasily create jealousy and resentment that the CCP would only be too happy tochannel externally. While such jealousy could also create resentment against theCCP for its inability to provide a standard of living comparable to that in theUnited States, such elements, even were they to come to power, would almostcertainly not be any more amenable to U.S. interests.

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Conclusion

Fundamentally, the freshwater scarcity problem in China is a manifestation ofthe conflict between market-driven economic growth and government-imposedsocial stability. With current water use exceeding sustainable levels and demandcontinuing to grow, effective government response cannot be postponed indefi-nitely. However, such a response will almost certainly impact the rapid, sustainedeconomic growth intrinsic to the continued legitimacy of the CCP. Even withpolicy responses that may be economically prudent over the long-term, there isa risk of creating highly destabilizing conditions during the transition period.Moreover, these conditions have empirically been associated with internal politi-cal violence on the part of the masses, elites, or both. The CCP, however, may bewell-positioned to redirect hostility outward, to the detriment of regional stabilityand great power relations.

The United States must be prepared to manage, or at least contain, any regionalinstability. In addition, the United States should offer to assist China with devel-oping and implementing solutions to its water scarcity problems. Despite realistconcerns about the potential threat to the United States from growing Chinesenational power, neither a Chinese domestic implosion, nor external aggressioninstigated by China to forestall such an implosion, is in the best interest of theUnited States. Although transition to a more democratic form of government mayultimately be beneficial to the United States, the region, and the world, the negativeconsequences—to the global economy and to stability in South Asia, SoutheastAsia, Northeast Asia, and even Central Asia—of any substantial transient insta-bility would almost certainly dwarf the benefits from Chinese domestic politicalreform. Moreover, there is no guarantee that any regime change would result indemocratic government or that the resulting regime would be any more inclined tooperate more cooperatively with the United States or the international community.Although there may be little the United States can do to directly prevent Chineseinternal (or regional) instability, proactive engagement and close monitoring ofChinese initiatives will be essential to anticipating and mitigating any detrimentalinternational consequences.

NOTES

1. Kathleen A. Cannon, “Water as a Source of Conflict and Instability in China,” Strategic Analysis30, no. 2 (2006): 310. Water quality in China is also a serious problem because of widespread pollution.Although this effectively reduces the available water supply still further and creates tension betweendifferent segments of the population, discussion of water quality issues is beyond the scope of thisarticle, because ultimately water pollution can be somewhat more easily addressed than absolute waterscarcity.

2. Prosperity has replaced ideology as the justification for CCP rule: “Over time, the reformprocess and continued economic growth have ceased to be a means to put China back on a socialisttrack—which is how they were originally posed in CCP writings—and have become ends in themselves.. . . The goal of achieving ‘advanced socialism’ was redefined as realizable through market competition.. . . Socialism itself was redefined as ‘common prosperity’ and the Party constitution was subsequently

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amended to state that class struggle was no longer the central problem of society.” Jamie Morgan,“China’s Growing Pains: Towards the (Global) Political Economy of Domestic Social Instability,”International Politics 45, no. 4 (2008): 416. This is a very rational basis for legitimacy from the CCP’sperspective, as studies have empirically demonstrated that high economic growth rates and prosperityreduce the risk of internal violence and instability, and “a state whose authority is deemed completelyillegitimate will find it much more difficult to maintain domestic order indefinitely, regardless of itscoercive power.” Colin Kahl, “Demographic Change, Natural Resources and Violence: The CurrentDebate,” Journal of International Affairs 56, no. 1 (2002): 263; Erich Weede, “On Political Violenceand its Avoidance,” Acta Politica 39, no. 2 (2004): 169; and Edward N. Muller and Erich Weede,“Cross-National Variation in Political Violence: A Rational Action Approach,” Journal of ConflictResolution 34, no. 4 (1990): 648.

3. Charles Wolf Jr., K. C. Yeh, Benjamin Zycher, Nicholas Eberstadt, and Sungho Lee, Fault Linesin China’s Economic Terrain (Santa Monica, CA: RAND, 2003), 87.

4. Ibid.; Cannon, “Water as a Source of Conflict,” 310.5. Wolf et al., Fault Lines, 82; and Cannon, “Water as a Source of Conflict,” 310.6. Cannon, “Water as a Source of Conflict,” 312, 318.7. Peter Navarro, The Coming China Wars: Where They Will Be Fought and How They Can Be

Won (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Financial Times, 2007), 151.8. Zmarak Shalizi, Addressing China’s Growing Water Shortages and Associated Social and

Environmental Consequences, World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 3895 (Washington, DC:World Bank, April 2006), 7; Wolf et al., Fault Lines, 76.

9. Shalizi, Addressing China’s Growing Water Shortages, 5.10. Ibid., 9.11. Ibid., 10.12. Ibid.; and Navarro, Coming China Wars, 156.13. Shalizi, Addressing China’s Growing Water Shortages, 10.14. Ibid.15. Navarro, Coming China Wars, 156.16. Shalizi, Addressing China’s Growing Water Shortages, 10.17. Jack A. Goldstone, “Population and Security: How Demographic Change Can Lead to Violent

Conflict,” Journal of International Affairs 56, no. 1 (2002): 6; and Nils Petter Gleditsch and HenrikUrdal, “Ecoviolence? Links Between Population Growth, Environmental Scarcity and Violent Conflictin Thomas Homer-Dixon’s Work,” Journal of International Affairs 56, no. 1 (2002): 297.

18. Wenche Hauge and Tanja Ellingsen, “Beyond Environmental Scarcity: Causal Pathways toConflict,” Journal of Peace Research 35, no. 3 (1998): 301.

19. Kahl, “Demographic Change, Natural Resources and Violence,” 267.20. Cannon, “Water as a Source of Conflict,” 312.21. Wolf et al., Fault Lines, 79–80; Shalizi, Addressing China’s Growing Water Shortages, 13, 21;

and Jim Yardley, “Beneath Booming Cities, China’s Future is Drying Up,” New York Times, September28, 2007, http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/28/world/asia/28water.html/ (accessed August 25, 2008).

22. Shalizi, Addressing China’s Growing Water Shortages, 21; and Yardley, “Beneath BoomingCities.”

23. Interestingly, there has been no appreciable shift in population from north to south, with therelative fraction in each region remaining virtually constant between 1980 and 2000. Shalizi, AddressingChina’s Growing Water Shortages, 7, 24–25.

24. Cannon, “Water as a Source of Conflict,” 319; Wolf et al., Fault Lines, 89.25. Wolf et al., Fault Lines, 89.26. With China’s monsoon climate, glacial melt is also important for buffering seasonal and

annual variations in precipitation, particularly in the flood-prone south. To maintain this bufferingcapability—and stabilize the water flow to the north—a number of new dams will likely be required.

27. Wolf et al., Fault Lines, 91.28. Shalizi, Addressing China’s Growing Water Shortages, 29.29. Cannon, “Water as a Source of Conflict,” 321.30. Ibid., 321–322; Ximing Cai, “Water Stress, Water Transfer and Social Equity in Northern

China: Implications for Policy Reforms” (paper, Human Development Report Office Occasional Paper2006/37 United Nations Development Programme, New York, NY, 2006), 9, 13.

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31. Shalizi, Addressing China’s Growing Water Shortages, 18.32. Ibid., 24; Wolf et al., Fault Lines, 97; and Cai, Water Stress, Water Transfer and Social Eq-

uity, 15. Despite importation of significant quantities of soybeans (primarily for livestock feed tosupport growing domestic demand for meat and dairy products), recent concerns regarding long-termglobal food supplies have revived China’s resolve to remain over 95 percent self-sufficient in grainthrough 2020. Antoaneta Bezlova, “Economy—China: Staring at Grain Imports,” Inter Press ServiceNews Agency, February 26, 2008, http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=41345 (accessed December9, 2009); “Development—China: Swinging Back to Food Self-Sufficiency,” Inter Press Service NewsAgency, April 10, 2008, http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=41939 (accessed December 9, 2009);Xinhua, “CPPCC Chief Proposes More Attention on Grain Security,” China Daily, October 18, 2008,http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2008-10/18/content 7118736.htm (accessed January 27, 2010);“China to Make Unremitting Efforts to Ensure Grain Security: Report,” China Daily, October 19,2008, http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2008–10/19/content 7119193.htm (accessed January 27,2010); “China Focus: Regions Work Toward Self Sufficiency Goal in Grain Supply,” People’s Daily,December 24, 2008, http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/90001/90776/90884/6561426.html (accessedJanuary 28, 2010); and Javier Blas and Geoff Dyer, “China Sows Seeds of Food Self-Sufficiency,” Fi-nancial Times, April 16, 2009, http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/c0d54870-2aa1-11de-8415-00144feabdc0,dwp uuid=0a8cf74c-6d6d-11da-a4df-0000779e2340.html (accessed December 9, 2009).

33. Cai, “Water Stress, Water Transfer and Social Equity,” 15–16.34. Goldstone, “Population and Security,” 5, 10, 14, 16.35. Shalizi, Addressing China’s Growing Water Shortages, 24.36. All other factors remaining the same, additional food imports would reduce the Chinese trade

surplus unless—and until—additional manufactured goods (produced using the sustainable portionof water formerly devoted to agriculture) could be exported for more than the value of the foodimports.

37. Although water prices have been raised to some extent, this would be a significant policy shift.“The Chinese Communist Party has singled out ‘rural unrest as the biggest threat to its rule’ andJiang Zemin has set boosting agricultural production, increasing farmers’ incomes, and maintainingstability in the villages as priorities.” Cannon, “Water as a Source of Conflict,” 314. “For a long time,government policy kept water prices low as part of a larger strategy to keep farmers in their fields inorder to avoid the huge social implications of a rush to the cities.” Shalizi, Addressing China’s GrowingWater Shortages, 13. In October 2006, President Hu Jintao spearheaded “a new Party initiative to reducethe growing inequalities in Chinese society, with a particular focus on urban employment conditionsand rural farming rights.” Morgan, “China’s Growing Pains,” 431. Abandoning such professed policieswould likely magnify displeasure with the government among affected elements of the population byengendering a sense of betrayal. The 2009 World Bank report Addressing China’s Water Scarcityrecommended marginal opportunity cost pricing of water but warned that “its social impact, especiallythe income impact on the poor, has to be addressed.” Jian Xie, Andres Liebenthal, Jeremy J. Warford,John A. Dixon, Manchuan Wang, Shiji Gao et al., “Addressing China’s Water Scarcity,” (World BankReport 47111, International Bank for Reconstruction and Development and World Bank, Washington,DC, January 1, 2009), 139.

38. Wolf et al., Fault Lines, 92; and Jian et al., Addressing China’s Water Scarcity, 27.39. Shalizi, Addressing China’s Growing Water Shortages, 20; Wolf et al., Fault Lines, 92. Recog-

nition of the utility of raising water prices to reduce (or reduce the growth rate of) water consumptionmay be spreading, however. The PRC Ministry of Water Resources reported that at a public hearingof the Beijing Municipal Development and Reform Commission held in December 2009, a majorityof those representing public stakeholders supported a proposed 24.3 percent increase in the price ofwater for residential use (from 3.7 to 4.6 yuan per m3). The plan includes government subsidies forlow-income families, but a journalist at the hearing reported widespread public disapproval of theproposal, and concerns were expressed regarding the level of water consumption by migrant pop-ulations and industry. In November 2009, nonresidential water prices were raised 48.6 percent, andseveral other cities, “including Shanghai, Tianjin, Shenyang, Guangzhou, Nanjing and Chongqing,” arealso considering water price increases. Ministry of Water Resources the People’s Republic of China,“Beijing Hikes Water Price to Ease Shortage,” Ministry of Water Resources, December 22, 2009,http://www.mwr.gov.cn/english/news/200912/t20091223 159422.html (accessed January 27, 2010).

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82 Asian Affairs: An American Review

40. Wolf et al., Fault Lines, 92.41. R. Edward Grumbine, “China’s Emergence and the Prospects for Global Sustainability,” Bio-

Science 57, no. 3 (2007): 251.42. Shalizi, Addressing China’s Growing Water Shortages, 23.43. Kahl, “Demographic Change, Natural Resources and Violence,” 262; and Gleditsch and Urdal,

“Ecoviolence,” 286.44. Kahl, “Demographic Change, Natural Resources and Violence,” 263; Gleditsch and Urdal,

“Ecoviolence,” 286; Erich Weede and Edward N. Muller, “Rebellion, Violence and Revolution: ARational Choice Perspective,” Journal of Peace Research 35, no. 1 (1998): 46, 55; and Weede, “OnPolitical Violence,” 157, 158.

45. Weede and Muller, “Rebellion, Violence and Revolution,” 46.46. Grumbine, “China’s Emergence,” 252.47. Lianjiang Li, “Political Trust in Rural China,” Modern China 30, no. 2 (2004): 237.48. Goldstone, “Population and Security,” 8.49. Ibid., 5, 10, 14.50. Weede and Muller, “Rebellion, Violence and Revolution,” 56.51. The last war over water was the conflict between Lagash and Umma, two Sumerian city-states.

Hans Petter Wollebæk Toset, Nils Petter Gleditsch, Havard Hegre, “Shared Rivers and InterstateConflict,” Political Geography 19, no. 8 (2000): 992, 993; and Goldstone, “Population and Security,”19.

52. Toset, Gleditsch, and Hegre, “Shared Rivers,” 993.53. Sandra L. Postel and Aaron T. Wolf, “Dehydrating Conflict,” Foreign Policy, no. 126 (2001):

64.54. Toset, Gleditsch, and Hegre, “Shared Rivers,” 976.55. Brahma Chellaney, “China Aims for Bigger Share of South Asia’s Water Lifeline,” Japan Times,

July 2 2007, http://yaleglobal.yale.edu/article.print?id=9377 (accessed August 25, 2008). The dam atXiaowan, scheduled for completion in 2012, will be the tallest in the world and will “hold 15 billioncubic meters of water, more than five times the combined capacity of the first three Chinese dams.” Adam at Nuozhadu will hold 23 billion cubic meters of water when completed in 2014. Michael Richard-son, “Dams in China Turn the Mekong Into a River of Discord,” YaleGlobal Online Magazine, July 162009, http://yaleglobal.yale.edu/content/dams-china-turn-mekong-river-discord (accessed February5, 2010).

56. Although China does provide hydrological data to the Mekong River Commission, and variousforms of development assistance and economic cooperation with the region (particularly through theASEAN—Mekong Basin Development Cooperation), China consistently rejects any arrangement thatwould restrict its sovereign control over the portion of Mekong River waters that lie within its borders, anattitude exemplified by its use of an entirely different name for its section of the river (i.e., the Lancang-Jiang River). Mekong River Commission, “China Re-affirms Commitment to Mekong/Lancang Coop-eration and Sharing Information,” Mekong River Commission, July 29 2009, http://www.mrcmekong.org/MRC news/press09/29Jul-09-China-re-affirms.htm (accessed January 11, 2010); National De-velopment and Reform Commission People’s Republic of China, “Chinese Delegation Briefed the10th Ministerial Meeting of the ASEAN—Mekong Basin Development Cooperation (AMBDC) onthe Latest Development of China’s Involvement under the AMBDC Framework,” National Develop-ment and Reform Commission, http://en.ndrc.gov.cn/newsrelease/t20080922 237214.htm (accessedJanuary 28, 2010); and Nargiza Salidjanova, “Chinese Damming of Mekong and Negative Reper-cussions for Tonle Sap” (paper, American University, Inventory of Conflict & Environment CaseStudies, Number 218, May 2007), http://www1.american.edu/ted/ice/mekong-china.htm (accessedJanuary 12, 2010). Ironically, the value to the downstream countries of these economic relationshipswith China mutes criticism and increases the tremendous deference and accommodation already ac-corded China as the regional economic and military hegemon. Salidjanova, “Chinese Damming ofMekong.”

57. For example, with Chinese damming of the Brahmaputra River, “India and Bangladesh wouldbe at China’s mercy during the dry spell and for protection from floods during the rainy season.”The Brahmaputra River alone “accounts for nearly 30 percent of the total water resources and about40 percent of the total hydropower potential of the country [India].” Zeenews Bureau, “RS Agency

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Spots China’s Dam on Brahmaputra,” November 4, 2009, http://www.zeenews.com/news575946.html(accessed February 7, 2010).

58. These rivers include the Indus, Mekong, Yangtze, Yellow, Salween, Brahmaputra, Karnali, andSutlej. Chellaney, “China Aims for Bigger Share.”

59. Ibid.60. Specifically, the book promotes diverting water from the Brahmaputra northward. Ibid. De-

spite years of denials from China, India’s National Remote Sensing Agency confirmed reportsthat China has begun construction of a dam on the Brahmaputra River at Zangmu. Reuters,“China Denies Plan to Dam Brahmaputra River,” Times of India, November 22, 2006, http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/msid-522947,flstry-1.cms (accessed February 7, 2010);and Zeenews Bureau, “RS Agency Spots China’s Dam.” Although India’s prime minister Man-mohan Singh described the construction as run-off-the-river works and not a dam, other reportsindicate that this will be the “world’s largest dam, with 26 turbines” and that it is only thefirst of five planned Chinese dams on the river. Zeenews Bureau, “RS Agency Spots China’sDam.” See also “China has Not Constructed Dam on Brahmaputra: PM,” Oneindia News, October20, 2009, http://news.oneindia.in/2009/10/20/china-has-not-constructed-dam-on-brahmaputra-pm.html (accessed February 7, 2010); and Pranab Dhal Samanta, “China Begins Building Dam onIts Side of the Brahmaputra,” Indian Express, October 15, 2009, http://www.indianexpress.com/news/china-begins-building-dam-on-its-side-of-the-brahmaputra/529244/0 (accessed February 7, 2010).2point6billion.com, “Uncertainty Over China’s Aims for Brahmaputra River,” Asia Briefing, Octo-ber 19, 2009, http://www.2point6billion.com/news/2009/10/19/uncertainty-over-china%E2%80%99s-aims-for-brahmaphutra-river-2652.html (accessed February 7, 2010). Although an expert-level mech-anism was established in November 2006 to facilitate information sharing between China and India,Indian efforts to broaden this exchange beyond flood season data have been unsuccessful. Samanta,“China Begins Building Dam”; and 2point6billion.com, “Uncertainty Over China’s Aims.”

61. Navarro, Coming China Wars, 152; Wolf et al., Fault Lines, 75; and Shalizi, Addressing China’sGrowing Water Shortages, 4.

62. Wolf et al., Fault Lines, 80; and James R. Davis and Rafik Hirji, “The Myth of Water Wars,”Georgetown Journal of International Affairs 6, no. 1 (2005): 116.

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