Racialized water governance: the ‘hydrological frontier’ in the Northern Territory, Australia

ABSTRACT

Increased scrutiny and contestation over recent water allocation practices and licencing decisions in the Northern Territory (NT) have exposed numerous inadequacies in its regulatory framework. Benchmarking against the National Water Initiative shows that NT lags behind national standards for water management. We describe key weaknesses in NT’s water law and policy, particularly for Indigenous rights and interests. NT is experiencing an acceleration of development, and is conceptualised as a ‘hydrological frontier’, where water governance has institutionalised regulatory spaces of inclusion and exclusion that entrench and (re)produce inequities and insecurities in water access. Regulations demarcate spaces in which laws and licencing practices provide certainty and security of rights for some water users, with opportunities to benefit from water development and services, while leaving much of NT (areas predominantly owned and occupied by Indigenous peoples) outside these legal protections. Water allocation and planning, as well as water service provision, continue to reinforce and reproduce racialised access to (and denial of) water rights. Combining an analysis of the law and policies that apply to water for economic development with those designed to regulate domestic water supply, we present a comprehensive and current picture of water insecurity for Indigenous peoples across the NT.

KEYWORDS:

• Aboriginal water reserve
• cultural water
• economic development
• northern territory
• water licence
• water planning
• water law

Acknowledgments

We would like to acknowledge the essential and painstaking efforts of Keeley Frost, research assistant, who completed a review of NT water licences. We also acknowledge the helpful feedback from the anonymous reviewers, and the advice received from the Northern Land Council. The authors also thank Francis Markham of the ANU for his generous assistance with the Aboriginal tenure data for Figure 1.

Disclosure statement

O’Donnell, Jackson and Godden have recently completed a funded research consultancy for the Northern Land Council.

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Notes

1. Available here https://nt.gov.au/environment/water/water-information-systems/water-licencing-portal

2. This paper is no longer publicly available.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Erin O’Donnell

Dr Erin O’Donnell is a water law and policy specialist, focusing on water markets, environmental flows, and water governance. Erin is recognized internationally for her research into the groundbreaking new field of legal rights for rivers, and the challenges and opportunities these new rights create for protecting the multiple social, cultural and natural values of rivers. Erin has recently completed a consultancy for The World Bank, on water markets and their role in water security and sustainable development. In 2018, Erin was appointed to the inaugural Birrarung Council, the voice of the Yarra River.

Sue Jackson

Professor Sue Jackson is a geographer with 25 years’ experience researching the social dimensions of natural resource management. She has 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 planning. She was awarded an Australian Research Council Future Fellowship in 2014.

Marcia Langton

Professor Marcia Langton AM is an anthropologist and geographer, and since 2000 has held the Foundation Chair of Australian Indigenous Studies at the University of Melbourne. She has produced a large body of knowledge in the areas of political and legal anthropology, Indigenous agreements and engagement with the minerals industry, and Indigenous culture and art.

Lee Godden

Professor Godden is the Director, Centre for Resources Energy and Environmental Law, Melbourne Law School. Her research interests include environmental law, natural resources law (especially water) property law and Indigenous peoples’ land rights.