The goal of the study is to strengthen the analytical purchase of the term water governance and improve the utility of the concept for describing and analyzing actual water distribution processes. We argue this is necessary as most writing on water governance is more concerned with promoting particular politically inspired agendas of what water governance should be than with understanding what it actually is. We believe that water governance at heart is about political choices as to where water should flow; about the norms, rules and laws on which such choices should be based; about who is best able or qualified to decide about this; and about the kind of societal future such choices support. We identify distributions-of water, voice and authority, and expertise-as the empirical anchor and entry-point of our conceptualization of water governance. This usefully allows foregrounding questions of equity in water governance discussions and provides the empirical foundation for a meaningful engagement with the politics of water governance.

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Over past decades strategies for improving access to drinking water in cities of the Global South have mainly focused on increasing coverage, while water quality has often been overlooked. This paper focuses on drinking water quality in the centralized water supply network of Lilongwe, the capital of Malawi. It shows how microbial contamination of drinking water is unequally distributed to consumers in low-income (unplanned areas) and higher-income neighbourhoods (planned areas). Microbial contamination and residual disinfectant concentration were measured in 170 water samples collected from in-house taps in high-income areas and from kiosks and water storage facilities in low-income areas between November 2014 and January 2015. Faecal contamination (Escherichia coli) was detected in 10% of the 40 samples collected from planned areas, in 59% of the 64 samples collected from kiosks in the unplanned areas and in 75% of the 32 samples of water stored at household level. Differences in water quality in planned and unplanned areas were found to be statistically significant at p < 0.05. Finally, the paper shows how the inequalities in microbial contamination of drinking water are produced by decisions both on the development of the water supply infrastructure and on how this is operated and maintained.

Due to the limited presence of formal water utilities in urban low-income areas in many developing countries, water supply is carried out by informal private providers. As part of efforts towards improving water services to low-income areas, the activities of these informal providers are currently being acknowledged through various formalization approaches. This article investigates one such formalization approach, which consists of partnerships between the utility and the informal providers. This is an approach which allows the utility to partially withdraw from service provisioning to the low-income areas. Based on empirical evidence from three such partnerships in low-income areas in three Kenyan cities, we show in this article that formalization redefines and strengthens the legal capacity of informal providers to gain control of service provision in these areas. This can bring benefits for the utility as well as for consumers. However, it also risks legitimizing and furthering the exploitation of consumers by informal providers. Keywords Formalization • Partnerships • Informal water providers • Formal water utility • Low-income areas • Kenya RésuméEn raison de la présence limitée de services d'eau officiels dans les zones urbaines à faible revenu de plusieurs pays en développement, l'approvisionnement d`eau est assuré par des prestataires privés informels. Pour améliorer les services d'eau dans les zones à faible revenu, les activités de ces fournisseurs informels sont actuellement reconnues par diverses approches de formalisation. Cet article examine une de ces approches de formalisation, en l`occurrence, celle qui se compose de partenariats entre le service public et les fournisseurs informels. C'est une approche qui permet au service public de se retirer partiellement de la fourniture de services d`eau dans les zones à faible revenu. Á partir des preuves empiriques issues de trois partenariats de ce type dans trois villes du Kenya, nous montrons dans cet article que la formalisation redéfinit et renforce la capacité juridique des fournisseurs informels à maîtriser la fourniture de services dans ces domaines. Cela peut présenter des avantages tant pour le service public que pour les consommateurs. Cependant, cela risque aussi From Rowdy Cartels to Organized Ones? The Transfer of Power… de légitimer et de favoriser l'exploitation des consommateurs par des fournisseurs informels. Water utilities in Kenya through benchmarking, collective learning and innovative financing (PEWAK) project funded by the Netherlands Enterprise Agency.