Introducing the Case Study Areas: Hydro-climatic and Governance Contexts - Climate Change and Water Governance: Adaptive Capacity in Chile and Switzerland - page 106

6.4 Development of the Governance Regimes

Table 6.2 Timeline showing the developments in environmental laws, institutions and policy in relation to the corresponding political and economic
landscape

Political & economic
developments

Environmental/internal governance
Environmental law & principles Period Country Trend

1870-1940 Switzerland After the end of WWII,

economic expansion rapidly
progressed
Deforestation in mountain areas
(especially the Alps) was
considered the main culprit
behind the damage caused
by a series of catastrophic
floods in the nineteenth
century (Mauch et al. 2000 ) .
Growth in demand of energy =
new competitive use of
water

1874: Federal Constitution - Art 24 (assigns
sovereignty over water and the superin-
tendence of forests in mountain regions
to the Confederation)

Simple regime, focussed on technical (and
responsive) solutions against natural
disasters and extreme events
Gradual realisation of the economic worth in
exploiting water power

1876: Federal Law on the Policing of Forests
1877: Federal Law on the Hydraulic
Engineering Policy: regulating flood and
erosion protection. Regulation is centred
at the federal level
1877: Federal Law on the Policing of Waters
1888: Law on Fishing with a paragraph
prohibiting the dumping of wastewater
and other substances by industry into
water bodies if this represented a threat to
fi sh and shell fi sh stocks

1874 - Introduction of the confederation as a
state actor - transfer of jurisdiction from
the cantons (Mauch et al. 2000 )