Dynamic adaptive policy pathways: A method for crafting robust decisions for a deeply uncertain world

A new paradigm for planning under conditions of deep uncertainty has emerged in the literature. According to this paradigm, a planner should create a strategic vision of the future, commit to short-term actions, and establish a framework to guide future actions. A plan that embodies these ideas allows for its dynamic adaptation over time to meet...

City Blueprints: 24 Indicators to Assess the Sustainability of the Urban Water Cycle

Climate change, population growth and increased consumption, coupled with urbanization, are all placing increased pressure on water management. This global challenge can often best be addressed at the local level, e.g. in cities by optimizing the role of civil society. Although there are approaches for assessing the sustainability of countries...

Supporting the Constructive Use of Existing Hydrological Models in Participatory Settings: A Set of “Rules of the Game”

When hydrological models are used in support of water management decisions, stakeholders often contest these models because they perceive certain aspects to be inadequately addressed. A strongly contested model may be abandoned completely, even when stakeholders could potentially agree on the validity of part of the information it can produce....

A parsimonious hydrological model for a data scarce dryland region

Inapplicability of state of the art hydrological models due to scarce data motivates the need for a modeling approach that can be well constrained to available data and still model the dominant processes. Such an approach requires embedded model relationships to be simple and parsimonious in parameters for robust model selection. Simplicity in...

Rotterdam: Dynamic Polder City = Land + Water + Culture

The planning culture in the Netherlands is based on the experience of building cities on very wet and soft soils. The design of Dutch polder cities was from early on a balance between land and water: building site preparation. The relation between technological development and urban development can be ordered in six phases: natural (-1000),...

Pilot Projects in Water Management

Pilot projects appear in many forms in policy making and management. In an effort to understand the nature and use of pilot projects and improve their effectiveness, we undertake a practice-based and theoretical study of the pilot project phenomenon. First, we examine the roles assigned to pilot projects in the policy development literature and...

A Framework for Clarifying “Participation” in Participatory Research to Prevent its Rejection for the Wrong Reasons

Participatory research relies on stakeholder inputs to obtain its acclaimed benefits of improved social relevance, validity, and actionability of research outcomes. We focus here on participatory research in the context of natural resource management. Participants’ acceptance of participatory research processes is key to their implementation....

Adaptive Water Governance: Assessing the Institutional Prescriptions of Adaptive (Co-)Management from a Governance Perspective and Defining a Research Agenda

This article assesses the institutional prescriptions of adaptive (co-)management based on a literature review of the (water) governance literature. The adaptive (co-)management literature contains four institutional prescriptions: collaboration in a polycentric governance system, public participation, an experimental approach to resource...

Scale issues in the governance of water storage projects

In the face of global change, which is characterized by growing water demands and increasingly variable water supplies, the equitable sharing of water and the drought proofing of rural livelihoods will require an increasing physical capacity to store water. This is especially true for the semiarid and dry subhumid regions of sub-Saharan Africa...