Water Resources and Indicators of Conflict

Abstract

Analysis of current economic and environmental trends reveals increasing competition over access to and use of freshwater resources at the same time that population growth, economic development, and potential climate change are adding stress to those resources. Given these trends, it is hardly surprising that in the policy literature and the popular press the issues of water and conflict are being raised together with increasing frequency. The Transboundary Freshwater Dispute Database (TFDD) project at Oregon State University delineates 261 international river basins. Professionals concerned with security-related issues have an interest in being able to identify which of those basins may be prone to conflict over water resources, from both a perspective of intra-state and inter-state instability and conflict. Having such knowledge allows for the possibility of “preventive diplomacy,” whereby diplomatic intervention prevents the escalation of disputes over shared water resources into violent conflict. Identification of basins prone to water conflict requires a framework that incorporates a wide array of physical, social, economic, and political variables, the implications of these variables at different spatial and temporal scales, and the linkages across scales. This paper proposes a methodology for defining potential indicators of international water conflict and portraying these indicators spatially within a Geographic Information System. Indicators will be defined across multiple scales in a parallel analysis of global and basin attributes. While indicators should be viewed with a healthy skepticism, they still provide value when defined through an effective analytical framework that takes into account the availability and appropriateness of relevant data and information sources.

Keywords:

• International river basins
• conflict
• indicators
• geographic information systems (GIS)