Water Ethics Working Group

David Groenfeldt

Member of the Scientific Steering Committee and Chair of the Water Ethics Working Group

An anthropologist, David Groenfeldt received his PhD in 1984 from the University of Arizona, based on field research on irrigation development in India. His career has focused on water, including five years with the International Water Management Institute in Sri Lanka and 13 years in Washington, DC working with consulting firms, and the World Bank, on water and natural resources policies in developing countries. More recently, David has focused on environmental and cultural aspects of water policies.  He helped establish the Indigenous Water Initiative to coordinate inputs from Indigenous Peoples in the World Water Forum in Kyoto (2003) and Mexico City (2006).  His work as director of the Santa Fe Watershed Association, in Santa Fe, New Mexico (USA) from 2006 to 2009 highlighted the role of community values in driving water policies.  He established the Water-Culture Institute in 2009 to promote the integration of traditional cultural values and ethics into water policies and practices.  He coordinates the Water Ethics Network  and is involved in developing a global charter on water ethics, as well as local water ethics charters at the level of cities and watersheds.   His ideas are outlined in two recent books, Water Ethics: A Values Approach to Solving the Water Crisis (2013), and Global Water Ethics: Towards a Global Ethics Charter (2017, co-edited with Rafael Ziegler).  David is also an Adjunct Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of New Mexico, Albuquerque.

Water Future Is Important To Me Because…

Future water decisions will be increasingly critical to get right, yet with changing circumstances from climate change, population growth and environmental degradation, we cannot simply apply lessons from the past.  We need to develop new future-oriented water strategies for our ever changing world.

Aaron Wolf

Member of the Water Ethics Core Group

Aaron T. Wolf is a professor of geography in the College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences at Oregon State University.  His research and teaching focus is on the interaction between water science and water policy, particularly as related to conflict prevention and resolution. He has acted as consultant to US Government agencies, the World Bank, and several governments on various aspects of transboundary water resources and dispute resolution.  All told, he is (co-) author or (co-) editor of seven books, including Core and Periphery: A Comprehensive Approach to Middle Eastern Water, (Oxford University Press, 1997), Transboundary Freshwater Dispute Resolution, (United Nations University Press, 2000), Managing and Transforming Water Conflicts (Cambridge University Press, 2009), and close to fifty journal articles, book chapters, and professional reports on various aspects of transboundary waters, from the local scale to the international.  A trained mediator/facilitator, he directs the Program in Water Conflict Management and Transformation, through which he has offered workshops, facilitation, and mediation in basins throughout the world.

Water Future Is Important To Me Because…

Everything we do, and the ecosystems on which we rely, depends on water, from our economies to our aesthetics to our spirituality.  Moreover, because it ignores boundaries, it provides us with a language to have conversations about our shared futures.

Xiao Yun Zheng

Member of the Water Ethics Working Group

Dr Xiao Yun Zheng is from Yunnan Academy of Social Sciences in China.

Water Future Is Important To Me Because…

Further information will be available in due course.

 

Rafael Ziegler

Member of the Water Ethics Working Group

Dr Rafael Ziegler is head of the social-ecological research group GETIDOS, which focuses on innovation and water. Ziegler has a Phd in Philosophy (McGill University) and a B.Sc in Philosophy and Economics (LSE). He is also a co-founder of the Big Jump Challenge, a European youth campaign for water conservation. The big jump taught him an important maxim: everything flows, if we are in the flow. A recent book publication (with the GETIDOS-team) is “Social Entrepreneurship in the water sector: getting things done sustainably”, Elgar: Cheltenham 2014.

Water Future Is Important To Me Because…

Water future is important, because without thinking about it, imagining and pre-configuring it, we will not move towards the water futures we want.

 

Susan Smith

Member of the Water Ethics Working Group

Dr Susan Smith is from the Faculty of Law, Willamette University in Oregon, USA

Water Future Is Important To Me Because…

Further information will be available in due course.

 

Glenn Schrader

Member of the Water Ethics Working Group

Dr Glenn Schrader is from the Department of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, University of Arizona, USA

Water Future Is Important To Me Because…

Further information will be available in due course.

Jeremy Schmidt

Member of the Water Ethics Working Group

Jeremy Schmidt is a Lecturer in Human Geography at Durham University. He is the author of Water: Abundance, Scarcity, and Security in the Age of Humanity (New York University Press, 2017) and the co-editor of Water Ethics: Foundational Readings for Students and Professionals (Island Press, 2010). In 2015, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada awarded Dr. Schmidt an Impact Award, which is its highest recognition for scholarship and knowledge mobilisation in Canada.

Dr. Schmidt’s work focuses on governance, ethics, and relationships among humans, non-humans, and water. His research has focused on the Canadian province of Alberta and on the role of American water managers internationally. In recent work, Dr. Schmidt has examined issues of ethics in the Anthropocene and is a collaborator on the SSHRC Partnership Grant: Economics in the Anthropocene. In addition to being used in numerous university courses, Dr. Schmidt’s research has also been used to pursue issues of justice and First Nations water rights in Alberta’s provincial legislature.

Water Future Is Important To Me Because…

Water Future is important to me because, despite the unparalleled value of water, we rarely understand how our history of ideas about it shape the way we imagine and pursue solutions to what are some of the most pressing issues of our time.

 

Darlene Sanderson

Member of the Water Ethics Working Group

Dr Darlene Sanderson  is from the School of Nursing, Thompson Rivers University in British Columbia, Canada.

Water Future Is Important To Me Because…

Further information will be available in due course.

 

Lucy Rodina

Member of the Water Ethics Working Group

Lucy Rodina is a PhD Candidate, supervised by Leila Harris, at the Institute for Resources, Environment and Sustainability (IRES) and a Liu Scholar at the Liu Institute for Global Issues. Her PhD research aims to investigate key themes in resilience thinking as they apply to urban water governance, with specific attention to droughts, floods and associated water-related risks, such as water pollution. One of the key objective of this research is to investigate the uptake and use of key constituents of resilience thinking in the context of urban water broadly, both conceptually and in practice. With a specific focus on a case study from South Africa, the goal is to theorize and develop a situated understanding of water resilience – attentive to specific biophysical environments, lived experiences, socio-political and governance contexts, power and marginalization – for water experts and decision makers on one hand, and residents of impoverished, peri-uban and informal settlements on the other.

Lucy did her MA at IRES with Dr. Leila Harris, working on water governance and the human right to water in South Africa. Before starting her Master’s, Lucy was involved in a water development project in the Nepalese Himalayas, focused on building irrigation canals and shaping strategies for future community development projects. Currently, Lucy is a member of the EDGES research collaborative and the Program on Water Governance. She is also actively involved with the Water Ethics Network. Learn more about Lucy here .

Water Future Is Important To Me Because…

Water Future is an important forum for research and dialogue on one of the most pressing challenges of our time – the sustainable and ethical future of our planet’s water resources

 

Marie-Hélène Parizeau

Member of the Water Ethics Working Group

Dr Marie-Hélène Parizeau is from the Faculty of Philosophy, Laval University, Quebec and is the President of  The World Commission on the Ethics of Scientific Knowledge and Technology (COMEST).

Water Future Is Important To Me Because…

Further information will be available in due course.

 

Luzma Nava

Member of the Water Ethics Working Group

Luzma Fabiola Nava is a Guest Research Scholar at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA). Recently she has gained post-doctoral research experience from IIASA. At IIASA she has conducted research on transboundary water resources between the United States (U.S.) and Mexico, and has given particular attention to the Rio Grande/Bravo (RGB) basin. One of the main results of this two years (2014-1016) research experience has been the elaboration of policy recommendations to improve transboundary water management and foster water resources sustainability between the U.S. and Mexico by means of redesigning the binational institutions which govern water resources allocation between these two countries.

Her primary research and professional interests include the use of political science and geography to analyse water resources management, water governance, sustainable development practices, stakeholders’ interests and perceptions. Luzma Fabiola Nava works collaboratively with other disciplines to promote stakeholders’ engagement and a better understanding of water resources challenges and issues across borders and within territories. For her, drawing policy recommendations based on stakeholders’ insights is essential to adapt management of water resources and ensure their sustainability.

Water Future Is Important To Me Because…

The Sustainable Water Future Programme (WATER FUTURE) is important for me because of it aims to translate science into policy and action.  The guiding principles of Water Future are based on the need to conduct interdisciplinary research in order to sustain water resources, integrate practitioners and stakeholders, and elaborate policy recommendations.

 

Simon Meisch

Member of the Water Ethics Working Group

Dr Simon Meisch is from the International Center for Ethics in the Sciences and Humanities, University of Tubingen, Germany.

Water Future Is Important To Me Because…

Further information will be available in due course.

 

Curt Meine

Member of the Water Ethics Working Group

Curt Meine is a conservation biologist and writer based in Sauk County, Wisconsin. He serves as Senior Fellow with the Chicago-based Center for Humans and Nature and with the Aldo Leopold Foundation in Baraboo, Wisconsin; as Research Associate with the International Crane Foundation (also in Baraboo); and as Adjunct Associate Professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He has authored and edited several books, including the biography Aldo Leopold: His Life and Work (reissued in 2010) and Correction Lines: Essays on Land, Leopold, and Conservation (2004). He has edited for the Library of America the definitive collection of Leopold’s writings, Aldo Leopold: A Sand County Almanac and Other Essays on Ecology and Conservation (2013). He also served as the on-screen guide in the Emmy Award-winning documentary film Green Fire: Aldo Leopold and a Land Ethic for Our Time (2011). He has worked with a wide variety of conservation organizations locally, across the U.S., and internationally.

Water Future Is Important To Me Because…

Water is life’s essential ingredient, and the future of our communities, our economies, and our ecosystems utterly depends on sustaining the health of our waters.  And we can only do that by recognising the sacred value of water in our lives and landscapes.  As it cycles, water binds us all—and all life—together.  By honouring the value of water, we honour our connections and our commitment to the future

 

Kenichi Matsui

Member of the Water Ethics Working Group

Matsui is Associate Professor at the Faculty of Life and Environmental Sciences, the University of Tsukuba, Japan. He received his Ph.D. from the University of British Columbia, Canada, in 2003, and taught in Canada until 2007. Since 2008, he has taught at the University of Tsukuba. As the principal researcher for Japanese government research grants, he has conducted researches on water rights, water ethics, water governance, Indigenous/traditional knowledge, Indigenous rights, biodiversity policies, and environmental dispute resolutions. He is the author of Native Peoples and Water Rights (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2009) and Culture and Sovereignty of Indigenous Peoples in North America (University of Tsukuba Press, 2013) as well as many academic journal publications. He has also contributed numerous articles to public magazines. He has served as the guest editor for two international journals, Water History (The Netherlands) and International Indigenous Policy Journal (Canada). In 2013, he was the Rachel Carson Fellow at the Ludwig-Maximilian University of Munich (LMU). He has more than thirteen years of experience as research consultant for law firms and Indigenous peoples’ organizations in Canada.

Since 2013, Matsui has served as the chair of the Sustainability Science, Technology, and Policy (SUSTEP) Program at the University of Tsukuba. This program encompasses both master’s and doctoral degrees and aims to foster global leaders. In this Program he has coordinated JICA-funded education activities for young government officials from 17 countries in Asia, Africa, and the Oceania. He teaches courses related to human/regional geography, environmental ethics/policies, and environmental history.

Water Future Is Important To Me Because…

Water, the water environment, and our culture are integral part of the biotic community. Water Future matters as long as we want to sustain and pass on our traditional culture to the next generations.

 

Jie Liu

Member of the Water Ethics Working Group

Dr. Liu received her Ph.D. in hydrogeology from the University of Alabama, U.S. in 2007, her Master in Ecology from Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences in 2002, and her Bachelor in Environmental Sciences from Shanxi University in 1999. She was a postdoctoral fellow at PKU from 2007 to 2009. Since 2009, she has been a research scientist in the Institute of Water Sciences. She has been chairing the Water Ethics working group of UNESCO since 2008. Dr. Liu’s major study areas include groundwater flow and transport modeling, basin-scale groundwater management, and water-energy nexus. She has been the principal investigator of research projects funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China, China Geological Survey, and National Geographic Society. She has also been a key participant in research projects supported by UNESCO, Ministry of Science and Technology, Ministry of Education of China, Ministry of Environmental Protection and other funding agencies. She has published more than 40 publications including two books (one translated) and four book chapters.

Water Future Is Important To Me Because…

Securing safe water supplies is fundamental to China’s social and economic development. As a research scientist working at the Institute of Water Sciences (IWS), Peking University (PKU), Dr. Jie Liu conducts water related studies driven by both curiosity and responsibility. Water Future provides an ideal platform for exchanging, sharing ideas and achieving the goal of securing safe water for all.

 

K. J. Joy

Member of the Water Ethics Working Group

Joy is a Senior Fellow at Society for Promoting Participative Ecosystem Management (SOPPECOM), Pune, India. He has a Master’s degree in Social Work from the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai. He has been an activist-researcher for more than 30 years and has a special interest in people’s institutions for natural resource management, especially water, both at the grassroots and policy levels. His other areas of interests include drought and drought proofing, participatory irrigation management, river basin management and multi-stakeholder processes, watershed based development, water and sanitation, biodiversity, water conflicts, right to water and sanitation,  and people’s movements. He coordinates the national level network in India on water conflicts, “Forum for Policy Dialogue on Water Conflicts in India. Presently he is also involved in the CCMCC-NWO research project, “Hydropower development in the context of climate change: Exploring conflicts and fostering cooperation across scales and boundaries in the Eastern Himalayas”. He has published extensively on water and development issues and some of his co-authored/edited books include 1) Sustainable Technology: Making Sardar Sarovar Project Viable; 2) Banking on Biomass: A New Strategy for Sustainable Prosperity Based on Renewable Energy and Dispersed Industrialisation; 3) Watershed Based Development: A Source Book; 4) Sustainable Prosperity: Sustaining and Enabling Natures Productive Powers; 5) Water: Sustainable and Efficient Use; 6) Community-based Natural Resource Management: Issues and Cases from South Asia; and 7) Water Conflicts in India: A Million Revolts in the Making.

Water Future Is Important To Me Because…

I see the importance and relevance of Water Future in the context of my work in India with regard to water conflicts. The different types of things that we can do through this – research, policy advocacy, sharing and networking, and development of a water ethics charter – can help in engaging with different types of water related conflicts.

 

Neelke Doorn

Member of the Water Ethics Working Group

Neelke Doorn is an Associate Professor in Ethics and Philosophy of Technology at the Technical University Delft, the Netherlands. She holds master degrees in civil engineering, philosophy and administrative law. Her current research concentrates on moral and distributive issues in water governance. In 2013, Neelke was awarded a prestigious Veni-grant for outstanding researchers from the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) for a project on the ethics of flood risk management. She was shortlisted for the Engineer of the Year Award 2014 from the Dutch professional engineering organization (KIVINIRIA) for her work on the interface of ethics and engineering.

Water Future Is Important To Me Because…

Water Future is important for me because water is essential for live, not just for humans but for all living things on our planet. Only if we jointly address issues of water security, be it a lack of clean drinking water, flooding, or water pollution, can we leave a healthy planet for future generations. This requires looking for solutions across different disciplines and sectoral approaches.

 

Michael Campana

Member of the Water Ethics Working Group

Dr Michael Campana is from the College of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences at Oregon State University, USA.

Water Future Is Important To Me Because…

Further information will be available in due course.

 

Anthony Akpan

Member of the Water Ethics Working Group

Anthony Akpan is the Founder and President of the Pan African Vision for the Environment (PAVE), in Nigeria. PAVE is a Lagos based  non profit, non-political, non-governmental organisation established with the aim of promoting sustainable development through research, documentation, policy dialogues, workshops, advocacy and consultancy services.  A human development and public policy specialist with B.Sc  in Applied Chemistry (University of Uyo, Nigeria), and Post Graduate Studies Diploma in Water Management, with specialisation in Water Services Management (UNESCO-IHE, Netherlands), with over 15 years sector experience in human ecology and sustainable development issues, spanning Non-Government Organisation (NGO) management, government, civil society, private sector and International development agencies relations.

Water Future Is Important To Me Because…

Water future is important to me because it provides an opportunity to explore different dimensions of water in the context of finding and  providing solutions through research and other related activities to addressing the problems related to the urgency of water security.

 

Sue Jackson

Member of the Environmental Flows Working Group and Member of the Rivers, Flows and People Working Group

Associate Professor Sue Jackson is a human geographer with twenty years’ experience researching the social dimensions of natural resource management.  She has strong research interests in the social and cultural values associated with water, customary Indigenous resource rights, systems of resource governance, and Indigenous capacity building for improved participation in natural resource management and water planning.  Sue is a Principal Research Fellow with the Australian Rivers Institute at Griffith University (Queensland) and an Honorary Fellow at Melbourne University’s Department of Geography. In 2013 she was awarded an Australian Research Council Future Fellowship.

Water Future is Important To Me Because….

Water Future offers a means of bringing scientists, water policy makers and managers together in efforts to address the sustainability challenge. By operating at the international scale it will enable knowledge exchange and experimentation in problem solving. I hope it can cross the boundaries established by the fields of research, policy and management practice and give full and effective consideration to the social and ecological complexity of the problems facing environmental water governance and management.