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Description / Abstract

Water policy has been subject to a sequence of preferred and changing driving ideas for two centuries. The integrated water resources management (IWRM) approach has been in currency for over a decade. Hydrologically inspired river basin management approaches were introduced in the 1960s and had very limited impact on policy making because they focused narrowly on the water resource and hydraulic interventions. There is a danger that the recent IWRM approach will also not serve well the needs of water policy-makers unless it escapes the assumptions of those parts of the water managing profession who believe that the river basin is the fundamental system. It will also fail if it is not recognized by practitioners and policy-makers that sustainability is as much about the social and economic as about water in the environment. It is suggested that IWRM should be re-named integrated water resources allocation and management (IWRAM) in order to capture the unavoidable conflictual nature of water allocation and management in water scarce regions. IWRAM is a political process; integration is political and management is political

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English