Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
environmental inequalities, because this model of centralized and planned eco-
nomic growth was made at the expense of rural livelihoods. For that reason, in the
s regime and after the death of Franco, rural and
peripheral regions and inhabitants protested and called for democratic water gov-
ernance, including participation in decision-making processes.
22
In South Africa,
until 1990, most of the projects designed were integrated into the apartheid
framework, and into a process of land appropriation by White people. The envi-
ronmental history of South African rivers cannot be separated from the general
history of this country.
23
The last century has proved that any political regime can
be harmful to environmental resources: grass-roots green and
nal period of dictatorship
'
“
blue
”
movements
can easily develop in democracies, but
“
technocratic
”
management remains pow-
erful and potentially dangerous.
Presented as triumphs of engineering
—
this view prevailed until late twentieth
century
s domination by humankind
and the economic development and modernization goals claimed by governments
of all kinds. Progressively, other voices emerged which tried to be heard: they
stated that these huge concrete works provoked ecological and social problems. For
instance, they underlined that dams were opposed to natural behaviors of animals,
like salmon in rivers. But dams not only constituted an impediment to the life of
ecosystems, they also changed the course of life for millions of people. Dams have
indeed provoked the displacement of people whose towns were inundated as part of
the water projects: sometimes, only a few families in what seemed urban/rural
con
—
the dams materialized both the idea of nature
'
icts in a period of depopulation of rural areas; in other occasions, several
thousands of people in India, or even more than one million in China, for the Three
Gorges Dam (for which structural work was
nished in 2006 and which produced a
lake of several-hundred-kilometers length), three decades after a rapid decline in
dam building in the Western countries. It is dif
gures, but in
2000, the World Commission on Dams estimated that between 40 million and 80
million people had been displaced by the settling of reservoirs.
cult to keep precise
4.3.3 Cities and Rivers: Intertwined Histories
Recent monographs (not only in environmental history) have explored the rela-
tionship between rivers and cities, which still stands as a fruitful topic for doctoral
dissertations.
24
In the mid-twentieth century, geographers were already aware of the
importance of water resources in the birth and growth of cities. Researchers focused
either on major cities and major rivers,
25
or on small rivers which have been used as
22
Swingedouw (
2007
) and Corral Broto (
2012
).
23
Blanchon (
2009
).
24
For a review of some recent theses, Frioux (
2012
).
25
Dagenais (
2011
).
