Water Institutional Reforms in Tajikistan - The Politics of Water Institutional Reform in Neopatrimonial States - page 158

7.4.3 The Impact of Local Governance Institutions on WIR

Local water governance is embedded in the institutions at the local level. They affect ISF and
WUA reform. As was described in chapter 5.5.4, formal local self government has been estab
lished but in practice, local power relations in rural areas are characterized by patronage rela
tions between the villagers and the rais . These are more or less strong in each place; a uniform
pattern cannot be identified. However, for those places with such strong patrimonial features
as observed in the local case study, their impact on WIR is comparable.
In the case study, official local self government could not be identified as playing an ac
tive role in village life. At first sight, the jamoat seems to be related to WUA activities. The chair
of the mahalla committee (and member of the WUA council) is also a representative to the
jamoat . 279 In practice however, the jamoat is astonishingly absent and the abovementioned con
nections were never mentioned by WUA council members when asked about their relationship
with the jamoat . The interviewed member of the jamoat council stated the jamoat itself could not
act due to the lack of resources but only participates in meetings. State structures do not ap
pear directly in daily village life and in WUA activities. If they play a role at all, then through
the rais or the brigadier, who are perceived as representatives of jamoat/khukumat decisions by
the local population.
In general, the WUA reform does not actively address official local governance institu
tions. One of the donors' arguments is that local organizations like the jamoat council ( sovet
jamoata ) and the DF director are not democratically elected bodies but nominated by the jamoat
or khukumat . If they establish new bodies, the process would be transparent right from the
beginning. Instead of addressing official local self government, the bottom up WUA projects
in the framework of community development programs projects refer to a certain 'community'
as a partner and try to incorporate its traditional organizations into the programs. Such inclu
sion can ease the acceptance of the new organization by the farmers. Some local organizations
have democratic potential: Mahalla committees and their chairs are in theory elected by con
sensus and people can complain to them. Village assemblies theoretically involve all inhabitants
of a settlement. In how far this is true in practice depends greatly on the specific community,
as each village is characterized by different power structures. The local level can be rather
democratic or highly unequal. In the local case study, villagers complained that the mahalla
committee did not care for them and that they could not approach it. The village assembly was
only attended by a minority of the inhabitants. 280 In addition, as was explained above, village
assemblies are often only gatherings of men. However, most agricultural work is done by
women. Due to inexistent or marginal salaries, many men migrate to Russia or other CIS coun
tries. 281 Since independence, Tajikistan therefore has faced a growing “feminization of agricul
tural labor force” (AAH 2003: 17). At the same time, women are only marginally represented
in local decision making processes. Public participation of women is often limited, and some
times they are completely excluded.
Hashar is the most popular local institution used in irrigation management. In many places
without WUAs, hashars are the only mode in which channels have been maintained since inde
279 The jamoat has a council of five people from every village. They are not elected but appointed by the village
assembly. They meet once in every three months.
280 Due to the fact that the so-called general village assemblies are seldom really assemblies of the whole village, the
new WUA organizational chart of GAA names it “meeting of village representatives”. This name mirrors reality more
unambiguously.
281 According to IOM, since 2000 about 632,000 men from Tajikistan have worked abroad as migrant laborers (that is
almost 10% of the entire population). 84% work in Russia. (AAH 2003: 17).