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ABSTRACT. Our research explores the context of water management in Scotland as it existed in late 2003. We took as a key question: Is the Scottish policy context conducive to the emergence of "social learning" as a purposeful policy option in the future management of water, and in the implementation of the European Water Framework Directive in particular? Data generated by several means, including semistructured interviews with key stakeholders, tested the explanatory potential of a SLIM (Social Learning for the Integrated Management and sustainable use of water) heuristic concerned with how changes in understanding and practices can transform situations to produce social learning. Our research demonstrates how the historical context, including initial starting conditions; conducive institutions, especially political devolution, and policies; facilitation; building stakeholding; and the use of learning processes together can create the possibilities for social learning. The processes that went on through the development of the Scottish Water Bill exemplify how social learning as concerted action emerged, but it did not do so from any overall purposeful design. A major challenge is to create purposefully the conditions for social learning as a deliberate policy or governance mechanism.

The RIVER BASIN GAME is a dialogue tool for decision makers and water users tested in Tanzania and Nigeria. It comprises a physical representation of a river catchment. A central channel flows between an upper watershed and a downstream wetland and has on it several intakes into irrigation systems. Glass marbles, representing water, roll down the channel. Participants place sticks to catch the marbles and scoop them into the irrigation systems. The players become highly animated and learn that being at the tail end leads to water shortages. The game promotes mutual understanding of a catchment, factors controlling access to water, conflict dynamics and allows participants to react to scenarios. By drawing from their own and outsiders' knowledge, players explore solutions to redistributing water. We examine the RIVER BASIN GAME as a metaphor, proposing that it has a mix of simplicity and realism that encourages players to understand issues of real-world complexity and scale. We suggest that the game's success is related to its quality of metaphor, influenced by organizational factors and by six game and gaming experiential axes each with two polarities: seriousness and play, accuracy and generality, internality and externality, connection and disconnection, individualism and collectivism, rule following and rule breaking.