Addressing Water Governance Challenges in the Anthropocene - Climate Change and Water Governance: Adaptive Capacity in Chile and Switzerland - page 10

coalition is in power, with potential consequences for the development and direction
of water governance. Field work in Chile took place about 7 months after the change
of government, with many of the civil servants from the previous government
recently out of their positions. The strong political influences of the neo-liberal
dogma for water resources management in Chile, defines not just the new govern-
ment, but also left its mark on policies followed during the period of the left wing
Concertacion. For example, in the northern areas of Chile, in response to growing
stresses from mining use and population growth, the previous government had
attempted to pressure, unsuccessfully, the Superintendencia into forcing the regional
utility to move to desalination.
As central and northern areas become drier, this policy could potentially imply a
transference of the costs of industrial over-consumption onto the domestic customer,
as the cost of moving to a desalination system would have increased water prices
three- or four-fold. Similar levels of worry persist with regards to the hydropower
sector, where concerns exist that Italian owned ENEL control 80% of non-con-
sumptive water rights in Chile and 96% of non-consumptive rights in the Aysen
area, which is the most water rich in Chile and one of the richest in the world
(Patagonia 2011 ). The challenges in the case area Aconcagua Basin are presently
not as highly contentious as northern or Patagonian areas of Chile, but increasingly
recurring drought, changes in glacier and snow coverage, mounting pressures from
mining and expanding agricultural coverage are all exerting mounting pressure on
water resources.
In Switzerland, a very different set of drivers frame the challenges, particularly
within the Alpine context of the Canton Valais. Traditional socio-economic struc-
tures in the alpine zone have undergone large upheavals over the last 50 years (Hill
et al. 2010 ), with consequent challenges for resource management. Not only have
alpine farmers played an important role in the governance of water through com-
mon property resource regimes, but they have been crucial in the development and
maintenance of water infrastructure in the upper watersheds of the Rhône. As there
are fewer full time and part time farmers, these traditional structures have suffered,
with consequences for water management in crucial periods.
These transitions have also brought new rivalries for water resources. The con-
vergent expanse in tourism in the major Valais ski resorts, with increasing require-
ments of water for artificial snow production as snow coverage becomes less
predictable intensifies existing rivalries on the tributaries to the Rhone in the Valais.
The on-going inclusion of environmental flows as a new 'user' of water resources
adds further tension to water governance across multiple sectors. Despite the image
of Switzerland, and in particular the Valais, as the Water Tower of Europe, the abun-
dance of water resources are highly spatially dependant, and periodic rivalries exist
not just during peak winter periods, but are increasing in the later periods of summer
(e.g. La Reche; Saviése; Conthey).
Both regions represent mountain watershed nivo-glacial regimes, where climate
change (as experienced through glacier melt and snow pack changes) will corre-
spond with changes in the seasonality of river flows. In both areas impacts of climate
change have already been observed on glacial melt and elevation of the snow line