Abstract
It seems that water is in the news almost daily. From the devastating drought in California to consumer complaints about the cost of water from privatized utilities in the United Kingdom, water is definitely emerging as a major sustainability issue of the 21st century. In this issue of Public Works Management & Policy (PWMP), we are pleased to present a collection of articles that look at water issues from several perspectives.
In “A Framework for Integrating Water Projects in Disaster Reconstruction Processes in the International Context,” Luke Juran makes the case that water projects triggered by disaster reconstruction are inherently unique and warrant a specialized approach. To guide reconstruction actors toward the establishment of more culturally and environmentally sensitive water arrangements, he has developed a framework of key points that should be considered. Informed by extensive fieldwork in post-tsunami India, this framework seeks to minimize project failures that have surfaced across space, time, and disasters.
Deya Roy addresses urban water supply networks in “Understanding the Delhi Urban Waterscape Through the Actor Network Theory.” This interesting essay explores how water infrastructure can be examined as a socio-technical system where the technological artifacts must work in harmony with governance networks and institutional frameworks. Post-disaster studies are finding that governance and institutions are key elements in resilient infrastructure systems that can hasten recovery following an extreme event.
The next two articles address financing and management issues that many water utilities are facing. “Predicting the Probability of Default for Municipal Water Utilities in Indonesia” by Andreas Wibowo and Hans Wilhelm Alfen presents a model to predict the probability that Indonesian municipal water utilities would default on their payments to the central government. Based on data from 126 actual cases, the model used measures of financial strength and technical efficiency to accurately predict performance 85% of the time. Ossi Heino, Tapio S. Katko, and Pekka E. Pietilä discuss the outsourcing of water utility operations and the prerequisites for successful partnerships between Finnish water utilities and external service providers in “Tighter Contracts or More Trust? Outsourcing in Finnish Water Utilities.” The outsourcing or privatization of water service is increasingly being tried in efforts to contain costs and/or improve service. Given the great deal of uncertainty inherent in these arrangements, they find that working to build trust may be more productive in the long run than attempting to reduce uncertainty.
The final article in this collection examines the evolution of Ethiopian water resources development in the last century through the lens of Community Managed Projects (CMP) for water supply and sanitation. “Evolution of Community-Managed Water Supply Projects From 1994 to the 2010s in Ethiopia” by Beshah M. Behailu, Arto Suominen, and Tapio S. Katko presents the various development phases of the water and sanitation sector in Ethiopia and how it has been shaped by national and global influences. Bringing clean water and sanitation services to rural areas in the developing world is a critical element in improving the health and well-being of millions of people. The use of CMP may aid in the more rapid deployment of effective and culturally appropriate technologies.