From supranational to intertribal - Governing Transboundary Waters: Canada, the United States, and Indigenous Communities - page 44

multinational and intertribal example. This chapter provides an introduction to
the IJC, but Chapter 4 goes into more depth about its expanding mechanisms
through their International Watersheds Initiative. I chose these four institutions
because they emerged under different socio-historical circumstances, they represent
different jurisdictional scales, and they have different relationships with the state.
Although I could identify other institutions to analyze (particularly the regional,
sub-state, and intertribal contexts), these four provide good examples to discuss
wider trends. In addition, I can speak to these organizations on a personal level,
having either interviewed people who work in these organizations or participated
in meetings and workshops hosted by these groups.
Engagement in the governance of transboundary water occurs at various
jurisdictional and managerial scales throughout North America (see Table 3.1) .
These mechanisms also change over time, reflecting different priorities and socio-
historical circumstances. Historicizing the development of these transboundary
institutions helps to unpack the social projects that are inscribed upon them. This
analysis also helps to open up wider questions regarding identity, citizenship, and
nationalism.
Table 3.2, for example, identifies five distinct periods of water management
specific to the Canada-U.S. border. These include: the Cooperative Development
Era, the Comprehensive Management Era, the Sustainable Development Era, the
Participatory Era, and a new category, which I refer to as “the Postcolonial Era”.
These eras reflect different priorities and different interpretations of the hydrological
landscape. In addition, the changing patterns of communication between people
and social networking have had significant impacts on how local communities are
engaged and mobilized into global discussions. Identifying these distinct eras helps
to highlight the reflexive relationship between institutional mechanisms and the
changing hydrosocial context. Thus, as scholars such as Swyngedouw (2004, 2006),
Budds (2009), and Bakker (2013) suggest, water issues are inseparable from the
political, economic, and historical circumstances they inhabit. This chapter docu-
ments how different governing institutions are conceived - and re-conceived - in
divergent spatial and temporal circumstances, and with different priorities in mind.
Situating the mechanisms in the specific context where they were created helps
to further explain the nuances of the changing patterns of water governance. This
analysis is noteworthy particularly in a transboundary context, where different
political systems, laws, and values converge.
It is important to note that the first three mechanisms follow state regimes and
treat the Canada-U.S. border as a fixed, naturalized, and abstracted bounded
demarcation of political power. The third, however, begins to reframe the
governing entities to focus on subnational entities, while the last framework begins
the analysis of Indigenous-led mechanisms that focus on intertribal water govern-
ance. All of the mechanisms are important components of transboundary water
governance and reflect changing expectations of water governance (particularly an
increase in citizen involvement in the decision-making process and greater
consideration of ecosystems in the governance of water).