Social impacts of a large-dam construction: the case of Castanhão, Brazil

ABSTRACT

Castanhão Dam, a mega-water-management work in Brazil, was built – according to the official reasoning – to reduce water scarcity and boost the economy. It compulsorily displaced over 10,000 people, whose satisfaction with the new standard of living, a decade after the resettlement, was marginally negative, contrasting with the pre-construction expectations. The government invested almost exclusively in infrastructure, signaling that their focus was the corporations, not the displaced citizens. Despite the improved water availability, the quality of life did not improve for the directly affected societal groups, indicating that water scarcity is not the main development hindrance in the Brazilian semi-arid region.

KEYWORDS:

• Dam construction
• compulsory displacement
• semi-arid regions
• socio-hydrology
• Brazil

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was funded by the Brazilian Ministry of Education (Capes Foundation, scholarship to the first author); and the Brazilian Research Council (CNPq) [Grant 301677/2015-8].