Global environmental justice and the right to water: The case of peri-urban Cochabamba and Delhi

Household access to water and choice of treatment methods: Empirical evidence from Bhutan

“…In poor countries, inadequate access to convenient water resources forces households to travel long distances and often means that children are employed to collect water, adversely affecting productive activities of adults and education of children (Mehta et al, 2014). In addition, poorer households may use water from open sources, often contaminated, which increases vulnerability to water-borne diseases.…”

Water marginalization at the urban fringe: environmental justice and urban political ecology across the North–South divide

“…12 Activists often cite the case of South Africa's constitutional amendment, which instituted a human right to water following the end of apartheid, as a potential model. Proceeding with caution since scholars have critiqued the effects of South Africa's model and raised doubts whether legally enforceable "rights" are possible in contexts of widespread informal land tenure (Mehta et al, 2014), there is nevertheless scope for indirect learning on what it would mean to construct both a legally enforceable and moral-political discourse claiming a right to water. This is especially urgent since, as discussed above, environmental regulations are often biased against the poor in India.…”

“…These are axes that concern social scientists, practitioners, and activists working on drinking water problems regardless of the context, but that are in urgent need of being brought under a common conceptual orbit. Building on other scholarship that strengthens exchanges between EJ and UPE on water poverty and politics (e.g., Debbané & Keil, 2004;Mehta, Allouche, Nicol, & Walnyck, 2014;Sultana & Loftus, 2012), we use each case heuristically to uncover commonalities and silences in the other. Extracting from the case of Tooleville, we argue that the proximate dimensions of water access, the regulatory state, and a rights-based framework provide fruitful arenas for transnational learning in the South.…”

Why Invisible Power and Structural Violence Persist in the Water Domain

“…They remain invisible and the power dynamics that reinforce them contribute to the precarity of poor residents. It is thus a challenge for most citizens to access water that is safe and secure (see Allen et al 2006 andMehta et al 2014). In many cases, they also opt out of the formal system, devise their own strategies and do not hope for any benefits from the state.…”