Hydrosocial territories: a political ecology perspective

TLDR

Territorial politics emerges from encounters among diverse actors with conflicting spatial and political-geographical interests. The study defines hydrosocial territories as spatial configurations of people, institutions, water flows, hydraulic technology, and the biophysical environment centered on water control, and argues that territorial struggles extend beyond resource battles to encompass meaning, norms, knowledge, identity, authority, and discourse. Territorial actors project, compete, superimpose, and align their territory‑building strategies, continuously recomposing the hydraulic grid, cultural reference frames, and political‑economic relationships to strengthen water‑control claims.

Abstract

We define and explore hydrosocial territories as spatial configurations of people, institutions, water flows, hydraulic technology and the biophysical environment that revolve around the control of water. Territorial politics finds expression in encounters of diverse actors with divergent spatial and political-geographical interests. Their territory-building projections and strategies compete, superimpose and align to strengthen specific water-control claims. Thereby, actors continuously recompose the territory’s hydraulic grid, cultural reference frames, and political-economic relationships. Using a political ecology focus, we argue that territorial struggles go beyond battles over natural resources as they involve struggles over meaning, norms, knowledge, identity, authority and discourses.