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  • Breaking Waters: The Birth of A New Nile State: Ana Elisa Cascão

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    The document summarizes the political dynamics around water sharing in the Nile River Basin prior to and following the 2011 uprisings. It discusses how Egypt had historically dominated control over the Nile's waters but that new states like Southern Sudan were emerging and upstream countries were growing economically, shifting the power dynamics. The revolutions in Egypt and Sudan further disrupted the status quo and opened possibilities for renegotiating water agreements and cooperation in the basin.

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    Breaking waters

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    The document summarizes the political dynamics around water sharing in the Nile River Basin prior to and following the 2011 uprisings. It discusses how Egypt had historically dominated control over the Nile's waters but that new states like Southern Sudan were emerging and upstream countries were growing economically, shifting the power dynamics. The revolutions in Egypt and Sudan further disrupted the status quo and opened possibilities for renegotiating water agreements and cooperation in the basin.

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    © All Rights Reserved
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    10 views19 pages

    Breaking Waters: The Birth of A New Nile State: Ana Elisa Cascão

    Uploaded by

    Waqar Ahmed
    The document summarizes the political dynamics around water sharing in the Nile River Basin prior to and following the 2011 uprisings. It discusses how Egypt had historically dominated control over the Nile's waters but that new states like Southern Sudan were emerging and upstream countries were growing economically, shifting the power dynamics. The revolutions in Egypt and Sudan further disrupted the status quo and opened possibilities for renegotiating water agreements and cooperation in the basin.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
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    of 19

    Breaking Waters:

    The Birth of a New Nile State


    .

    STEPS Centre Water Seminar


    Brighton, 22 February 2011

    Ana Elisa Cascão


    Stockholm International Water Institute – SIWI (Sweden)
    Center of African Studies – ISCTE (Portugal)
    Nile River Basin

    THE REGION
    10 riparian states
    160 million inhabitants
    Underdeveloped economies
    Conflict-stricken region
    Low levels of regional integration
    Nile Basin Hydropolitics

    • Water = Politics
    • Uneven • Water = National Security • Problematic water
    distribution • Water = Sovereignty agreements
    • Inequitable • Past: conflicts
    utilisation • Water-Sharing:
    • Power asymmetries political priority
    • Hydro-Hegemony

    H YD R O -
    S E C U R IT IS A S O V E R E IG N C O O P E R A TI
    T IO N TY ON
    Nile Basin Political Economy pre-2011

    Egypt:
    ‘Hydraulic state’ still expanding
    Monopoly of the Nile waters
    Stronger and more diversified economy
    Monolithic and stable political system
    Support of international community

    Upstream:
    Agriculture-based economies (rainfed)
    Weaker but growing economies
    Shadow of conflicts still present
    Changing geopolitics
    Nile Basin Political Economy pre-2011

    Changing realpolitik:
    new geopolitical actors, corridors, dynamics, ...

    Regional integration: Unilateralism:


    Towards economic Unilateral hydraulic
    multilaterism development

    ‘Land grabbing’:
    Growing economic interest for Nile natural resources
    Hydropolitics pre-2011

    Official
    ‘diad’

    Upstream
    Bloc
    2010:
    Cooperation and changing power relations
    Trojan Horse of
    upstreamers
    2011:
    ‘Revolutions’ in the making in the Nile Basin

    Popular uprising in Egypt

    Velvet divorce in Sudan


    Southern Sudan:
    the 11th Nile riparian

    Border demarcation
    (as 1956)
    ...where the White Nile bends
    Southern Sudan:
    the political process

    the post-referendum negotiations


    Nile Waters:
    What is in it for Southern Sudan?
    A midstream or an upstream riparian?

    Jonglei Canal
    When Oil or Water politics mix
    Meanwhile.... in northern Sudan
    • Windown of opportunity for the end of ‘Nile Valley Unit’
    • Back to the origins: irrigation!
    Egypt, revolution and Nile

    • No major changes in internal Nile politics, image, discourse


    • Possible positive change in foreign policy – ‘between equals’
    • Negative change also possible: a return to hydraulic nationalism
    Egypt vs. Upstream: power is relational

    • Egypt, the stable hegemon: is


    now past history

    • Upstreamers and the Sudan(s)


    might take advantage of
    Egypt’s current weakness to
    promote a tipping point in the
    Nile hydropolitics
    Crystal Ball
    • Southern Sudan: might become the kingmaker in the upstream-
    downstream Nile hydropolitics
    • Northern Sudan: a pure midstream riparian
    • Egypt: potential for new foreign policy in the long-term
    • Today: upstreamers might be already taking a shortcut and
    speeding change in the Nile Basin

    • What occurs when the counter-hegemonic riparians get


    stronger and the hegemon weaker: the transformation, decline
    or end of the hegemonic configuration?
    Thank you!
    ana.cascao@siwi.org

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