The Emerging Role of Civil Society for Water Governance

in Bangladesh

Background InformationWater crisis scenario-at a glance

• Overwhelming dependency on water resources/highly dense population/ chronic poverty most environmentally vulnerable areas

• By 2050 the population over 220 million [1]

• 79.85% of the people rural[2]

• Agriculture 63% of the labor force/ 19% of GDP. • Fisheries sector 9% of the country employs/ 4% GDP [3]

• Water crisis excessive and scarcity of water• Frequent flood/ draught/salinity intrusion/deforestation/water pollution

• The ground water arsenic contamination

• At present, water resources highly scared, eroded and degraded

• Immediate risk global warming and rise in sea levels. Only 50cm sea level rise engulf two-thirds of the country [4]

• Most of surface water controlled from outside of the country

• Competition / environmental degradation / environmental change

livelihood insecurity / environmental refugee.

• Upcoming decades most critical issue?

Aim & Rationale of this presentation

• To understand the environment-security linkage focusing on the emerging role of civil society in the water governance Whether civil society can play a responsive role in the decision

making of water governance in Bangladesh? If so, then how the civil societies in Bangladesh can increase

public involvement in decision making?

Water related studies

engineering and agricultural perspective

focused on water institutions and policies

the interactions between politics, civil society, institutions are nominal

Key concept (1) Water governance

Governance establishment and operational of social institutions (sets of rules, decision making procedures and programmatic activities)

• Water governance not only on specific institutions overall governance context determine who gets what in water

to make space both for state and non state actors

This demands public participation as the foundation of their political legitimacy.

state the arena of collective action which is essential for environmental governance

Key concept (2)Civil society

Civil society a set of intermediary groups in the public sphere, which can act independently of the state authorities, market

activities and family

The concept based on the normative values of civil rights ‘civil society’ as a public sphere in general different from society in general

As the essence of civil society is collective action, it does offer a touchtone for social movements and a practical framework for organizing resistance and alternative

solutions to social, economic and political problems [5]

The actor of civil society volunteer organization/NGOs/political group/ labor union/ media/ business sector /cultural and religious organizations /academe and international community

Key concept (3)Environmental security

Environmental security

response to non traditional environmental threats to human security.

public safety from environmental dangers caused by natural or human process.

In this study environmental threats

water related crisis

The Framework for environment-security linkage

Social effects

Instability, conflict, insecurity

Water crisis

Co-operation, stability

Effective adaptive mechanism

(Right based approach, collective decision making))

Weak & negative adaptive Mechanism(fragmented and state centric approach)

Socio-economic factor (population growth, poverty)

Environmental& Social stress

Key argument

• The problem of water crisis and its consequences greatly lie on water-governance problem rather the resource scarcity.

• Sustainability of water resources require better water governance. For this the communities must be involved in a democratic participatory process of decision making.

• The huge coverage of civil society in Bangladesh have high potential to use advocacy to involve the poor people in the decision making and to move beyond the patron-client relationship

• Involvement of civil society in water governance process thus is itself a sustainability strategy.

Water resource management- at a glance(Past trends)

Past four decades dominated by an engineering paradigm

focused on flood control, drainage and irrigation projectswhich caused serious adverse environmental impacts

sectoral and fragmented approach

socio-political aspects were very much nominal

based on top down approachlocal level water institutions were particularly more weak

stake holder participation was almost unknownthe participatory process has been introduced only to gather

the information but not for the final approval[6].

The emergences of civil society in changing policy process of water sectorIn the 1990s the pressure from NGOs and Donor community

restructuring of the water sectorpressure for reform continued

In 1998 FAP (Flood Action Plan) recommendation the pressure from NGOs and Donors

a comprehensive NWPo was initiated

In 1999 The National Water Policy (NWPo) In 2004 National Water Management Plan(NWMP)

The National Water Policy (NWPo) Put much emphasis on

integrated management, community involvement/ stake holder involvement and necessity of institutional change

This policy changes can be seen as part of wider social and political moves towards democratization and decentralization of water

governance

Much of this process will depend on the implementation process the interaction of state-society

Civil Society in Bangladesh Coverage-at a glance

By 2000 more than 90 percent of rural communities have some NGO presence[7]

civil society includes (registered with the Department of Social Welfare.)

approximately 45,000 thousand clubs, local level organization, religious organizations, foundations and

development oriented NGOs [8]

By the late of 2004 1882 NGOs were registered with NGO Affair Bureau, 1,100-1,200 of them receiving foreign funds[9].

Around 700 NGOs are active in the water and sanitation sector

Civil society in Advocacy and in environmental issues

In the 1990sNGO advocacy with the emergence of multiparty electoral

democracy By the mid 1990s

development NGOs build new alliances develop new strategies

In case of environmental issue the emergences basically since the 1990s (when as a whole

NGO sector gain prominence in the advocacy activities)

campaign against use of polythene awareness activities on air pollution, road side forestation, drinking safe water, hygiene and sanitation.campaign against the inter-linking project of IndiaCommunity Based Natural Resource Management program

The scope of civil societyThis huge coverage & advocacy role

itself a huge potential for enhancing public involvementone powerful challenge to the patron-client structure through

service delivery activities.striking progress on a range of social indicators an achievement widely credited to the country’s pluralist

service provision [10]

The 2005 Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP) NGOs role as an integral part

Traditional society longer historical experiencesThe language movement in 1952the independence struggle in 1971the democratization movement in 1990

•

With a full fledged coverage of civil society

can hold the state accountable for its misdeeds of commission or omission

can facilitate citizen inputs to water policy making can press the state to be more equitable in allocating water resources

Civil society does offer a real potential for dealing with livelihood security and can press the state to fulfill its responsibility to protect citizens.

Strategy for civil society

This paper suggest two strategies to pursue the advocacy

directly targeting the pro-poor groupspressing local government unit in such areas like

distributing khas (govt. owned) land and water bodies, guaranteeing access to water bodies etc

forge coalitions with non-poor groups to press more broad-based research agenda that can gain widespread support[11]

Working place for civil society

Government tier-at a glance • Union Parisad -the most grassroots level

government tier (has little funding and less capacity)

• Upazilla level government tier – Not put in Place

• Central governmental tier-Member of Parliament (MP)

• local civil society initiatives confined to the Union level

But they can advocate at the Upazilla level

can press the TNO (Thana Nirbahi Officer) and ministry officers

promote to reform the local governance structure

to work directly with MPsbuild the main political link between village and

capital.can co-ordinate with other central level CSOs

Real scenario and constrains

Attempts to move the dominant political mode invite conflict relationship

Advocacy activities done by NGOs highly dependent on foreign donation

In 2000-1 the government accused a few NGOs stretching their advocacy work into partisan political activity.

Still most of CSOs inactive or in poor performance

Decentralization and participatory initiatives controlled by the local elites

Conclusion

• In spite of these limitations and constrain there is huge opportunities for collective action of CSO advocacy in Bangladesh and their role in water management sector is emerging.

• Public involvement in decision making is possible only when the poor can move from the patron client relationship. Thus grass roots level CSO advocacy can be a sustainable strategy for such process.

• The simultaneous initiatives targeting pro-poor group and the non poor groups can reduce the conflicting relation between patron-client or elite-poor.