Environmental Engineering Reference
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integrative management approaches as earlier theory had suggested (Huntjens et al.
2010
). The approaches characterised as transformative or adaptive in the decentralised
Swiss model were driven by top-down policy and legislative frameworks. However,
these top down frameworks were in part informed by the strong voice afforded to
environmental organisations within the Swiss direct democratic governance model
(see discussion in Part II). On the other hand, the Chilean case represents a centra-
lised model of governance where the lowest governance level is the user or rights
owners, who through the Water Code are granted a high level of autonomy in the
management of water resources. In both cases the autonomy of the lowest level of
governance (in Chile this level is private, and in Switzerland it is public) limits the
ability to proactively build solutions for broader more complex issues in water
resources management.
Hence, evidence from the Swiss and Chilean cases reinforce the finding in
Huntjens et al. (
2010,
2011
), that fine tuning the balance between bottom-up and
top-down approaches may be more important than proposing the more simple solu-
tion of promoting bottom-up and decentralised governance for managing water
issues. Public authorities at higher or lower levels, whether in a centralised or decen-
tralised system, have an important role to play in conflict resolution, cooperation
building and facilitation, priority and standard setting as well as certain levels of
information generation and provision (Huntjens et al.
2010
) .
The importance of trust building for cooperation has been highlighted in a
number of studies by Elinor Ostrom and her collaborators (Poteete et al.
2010
) ,
in the investigation of collective action for cooperative solutions to resource
management challenges. It is the mix of the design principles relation to the
availability of knowledge on short and long term impacts with the ability to share
that knowledge equitably between actors that can in effect have more influence
on cooperation and trust generation than top down policy or rule setting.
Moreover, the Chilean case reinforces the evidence that in the absence of trust or
respect for government, top down rule setting can also increase the challenges
for enforcement and implementation (Ostrom
2010
). Interestingly, in the Swiss
case, stakeholders in the agricultural sector were not only aware of the research
by Netting (
1981
) and Ostrom (
1990
), but also expressly pointed out that it was
in the interest of the canton to foster elements of the common property systems
that had managed the Suonen/Bisses systems for centuries, to ensure collective
action and responsibility for irrigation and watercourses was maintained at the
local level.
The TRC, as the example of a transformative outcome, aligns different regime
and knowledge indicators for the development of a management approach that
takes into account both anticipatory and reactive adaptive capacity development
and mobilisation. The aim is not only to enhance longer term resilience of the
flood prone areas of the Rhône valley, but also to develop information and knowl-
edge networks that would take better account of climate change related increases
in flow and limit their damage through flexible buffers (e.g. evacuation corridors,
buffer zones). While non state actors, such as environmental organisations,
played an integral role in shaping the legislative baselines of the project, the
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