Learning from Failure in Sanitation (Part II )

by Stephen Jones for BPD Water and Sanitation

In December we blogged about learning from failure in sanitation, based on thought-provoking discussions at a workshop organised by the UK Sanitation Community of

Poor sanitation in
Antananarivo, Madagascar
Credit: Pippa Scott

Practice (SanCoP), of which BPD is one of the convening organisations. Following on from this, five SanCoP members have co-authored a discussion paper: Learning from failure: lessons for the sanitation sector. We presented the paper at the most recent SanCoP workshop, held at University College London in April 2013. Below is an abstract. We would love to hear your feedback and ideas using the comments feature below. 

Stephen Jones and Nicola Greene have also co-authored a shorter commentary piece based on ideas in the discussion paper: Crossfire: Can ‘admitting failure’ help the WASH sector learn and improve its work?, published in the April 2013 edition of open-access journal Waterlines.

For examples of 'failure' in sanitation and also water projects, see this ongoing blog from Improve International.

Abstract from 

Learning from failure: lessons for the sanitation sector

by Stephen Jones, Nicola Greene, Andrés Hueso, Hayley Sharp and
Ruth Kennedy-Walker, April 2013

This paper explores the idea of learning from failure in the sanitation sector. The recent trend of ‘admitting failure’ in aid and development forces sanitation practitioners, researchers and policy-makers to ask if we can and should address failure more openly in order to improve our work. The ideas in this paper developed from discussions at a workshop on ‘learning from failure’ convened by the UK Sanitation Community of Practice (SanCoP) designed to kickstart this debate.

We first discuss the concept of failure itself and identify different approaches to learning from failure relating to sanitation. These include acknowledging past failures in order to learn and adapt, and planning for ‘safe’ future failures through deliberate experimentation and innovation. We also argue that a series of further steps are required: understanding relevant previous approaches to learning from failure in the sector; recognizing different types of failure; seeking different actors’ perspectives on failure; and framing the debate about failure constructively rather than negatively.

In the second part of the paper we examine different practical examples of how actors in the sanitation sector have tried to learn from failure, to assess how this happened and what changes resulted. In the final section of the paper we conclude with suggestions for how individuals and organisations working in sanitation and international development more widely can learn from failure. We also propose the UK Sanitation Community of Practice (SanCoP) itself as one example of a ‘safe space’ in which people can meet to discuss and learn from failure.

License to Play (Part II): Sustaining the Gains of WASH in Schools

by Jacques-Edouard Tiberghien for BPD

In our last blog post, we set out some of the issues discussed at the

WinS project, El Salvador. 

Credit: BPD/ J.E. Tiberghien

“License to Play” WASH in Schools (WinS) session held by BPD at UNC Water Health and Policy Conference 2012. Acknowledging that sustainable WASH in Schools (WinS) programmes require effective local-level partnerships, we suggested that a dedicated ‘WinS partnership toolkit’* could help stakeholders build and manage stronger relationships.

Here we discuss the steps taken during the same workshop to start reflecting on what a WinS ‘partnership toolkit’ could look like. This process involved working through three simple existing partnership tools used by BPD:

1. Listing and categorising stakeholders at local and district levels
2. Identifying stakeholders’ incentives to be involved
3. Defining stakeholders’ potential respective functions

(*By ‘WinS partnership toolkit’ we simply mean using tried and tested WASH partnership tools in a WinS context, as well as training and facilitation processes. For examples of such tools and related learning, see BPD’s website.)

Step 1: Listing the vast array of WinS stakeholders

As a group, participants identified an array of stakeholders and institutions operating at both the local and district level and grouped them into five broad categories - School, community, district, private sector and external support.

1. School: Students and teachers trained as hygiene educators, school caretakers, school management committees, student clubs, parents and Parent Teacher Associations.
2. Community: Mothers’ groups, local entrepreneurs (e.g. soap/toilet paper suppliers), local water boards, government institutions (e.g. the Ministry of Environment or municipal mayors).
3. Private sector: At community level this included private health institutions, community health workers and local benefactors.
4. District: Local civil society, research centres, health facilities and the Ministry of Education.
5. External actors: NGOs, governmental agencies, funding institutions and the media

Although identifying possible WinS stakeholders was straightforward, it was an eye-opener for many participants who had not previously realized how numerous these can be and the wealth of resources they potentially bring to WinS programs. Not being context specific made the exercise useful for comparing the types of people and organisations involved from one country to another.

Step 2: Identifying stakeholder incentives

Participants were then split into groups representing each of the categories. Their task was to identify the incentives of each stakeholder group. These were seen to include:

• School level: Improving the overall health and wellbeing of students and the school environment, and promoting gender equality (by increasing female attendance).
• Community-level: The desire to have a ‘good school’, where students can actually learn and achieve their full potential and the need to cultivate a sense of security within the community and promote good health.
• Private sector: Profit, corporate social responsibility (CSR) and in some instances long-term core business development.
• External agencies: Reputation, existing relationships with schools, and grant/ donor requirements.

The limited time made it impossible to separate the incentives of the various stakeholders in each category, which led to some generalisations and imprecision. However, the systematic identification and ranking of stakeholders’ incentives was something new for many and was found to greatly help understand some of the dynamics at play in local-level WinS partnerships.

When carried out on the ground by local stakeholders of WinS programs, such a process (which will be much more accurate when context-specific) should make partners’ behaviour more predictable and help stakeholders understand the fundamental reasons often underlying greater, lesser or shifting engagement. Partners will get to know each other better and the partnerships they form will become more self-reflective and responsive.

Step 3: Defining roles and responsibilities

Having identified potential WinS stakeholders and listed their likely

UNC WinS workshop. 

Credit: BPD/ J.E. Tiberghien

incentives, two groups went on to determine their likely respective functions. One group focused on hardware functions; the other on software functions of a typical WinS partnership. Simply put, hardware functions were defined as the operation and maintenance of water supply (pipes, toilets and treatment devices), solid waste management and oversight of water quality. Software functions referred not only to the provision of consumables (soap, detergent, toilet paper etc.) but also to the monitoring of WASH standards. Relative contributions of the different stakeholders to each function were then discussed.

Reviewing the wide range of activities necessary to achieve a basic level of sustainable services enabled participants to clearly grasp the complexity of WinS work. Defining stakeholder functions shed some light on a possible range of scenarios, roles and responsibilities and the resulting negotiation needed.

Observations

Compliance and accountability

Obviously it was not possible in the short timeframe of the session to go into depth or consider context-specific cases. A number of critical points could not be covered, such as the issue of partners’ compliance. While formal attribution of specific roles and responsibilities will clarify the ‘rules of the game’ for partners, clearly it will not dissipate all tensions between partners nor guarantee their compliance to what has been agreed. Accountability is another important issue: Getting local partners to agree on viable accountability mechanisms (i.e. ways to foster compliance, transparency and responsiveness) generally proves very difficult. BPD’s experience suggests that this process will be more productive if discussions about stakeholders’ incentives accompany the development of these mechanisms.

Understanding and addressing tensions

WinS project, Nicaragua.
Credit: BPD/ J.E. Tiberghien

This mini-workshop allowed participants to grapple with the unique nature of WinS partnerships, focusing on the local level (school, community and district), where stronger and more accountable partnerships are particularly needed. In addition, by identifying the respective incentives of the numerous and diverse stakeholders to engage in WinS work, the group started to envisage the sort of tensions that could potentially arise in these partnerships. Acknowledging, and understanding such tensions from an incentive perspective enables ‘interest-based’ negotiations, which are far more productive than ‘position-based’ confrontations.

Summary

Using tried and tested participatory partnership tools with more local-level WinS programmes could lead to better managed and more effective partnerships on the ground – an essential step towards sustaining project gains.

Continuing the conversation

BPD found the UNC session very thought-provoking and is keen to stimulate further conversations on this topic.

Join the conversation on the LinkedIn SanCop (Sanitation Community of Practice) group.

Download BPD’s SWASH+ WinS evaluation (executive summary and recommendations) of this IDB/ MWA initiative in Central America.

See more partnership tools, tips and resources from BPD

Watch a short video on the SWASH+ WinS programme in Kenya, highlighting the need for collaboration among parents, students, teachers and governments to improve WinS in the long term.

License to Play: Sustaining the Gains of WASH in Schools

by Jacques-Edouard Tiberghien and Aliki Zeri for BPD

UNC WinS Workshop. Credit: BPD Water and Sanitation

Some 30 participants attended the “License to Play” session held by BPD on the final day of UNC Water Health and Policy Conference 2012 to address the following urgent questions on WASH in Schools (WinS):

• How can gains from WinS programmes be sustainable? 
• How can the provision of WASH services in every school be expanded? 
• What accountability mechanisms can be put in place at the local level until governments take full responsibility for the sustainability of existing or planned WinS services? 
• Would a partnership approach help to address these challenges and what would a WinS partnership toolkit look like? 

Led by the hand through this playful and interactive session, we all enjoyed a trip back in time to primary school - thanks to ‘teacher’ Ms Keatman, her blackboard and chalks – working with scissors, glue and coloured pens to capture the main challenges and possible solutions to this critically important issue.

Governments are failing to sustain WinS gains

At the heart of WinS programmes lies the desire to allow every child and teacher in every school to access proper WASH services by providing clean, functional and well-maintained WASH facilities; making essential consumables like soap, toilet paper and detergents readily available; and effectively promoting good hygiene behaviours. 

Making governments responsible for the provision and sustainability of these services is an equally important but greater challenge. BPD’s recent WinS evaluation work in Morocco, Kenya, Nicaragua, El Salvador and Guatemala confirmed an already well-known fact: Government agencies are often unable to deliver even the very minimum level of WinS services. A number of possible causes stand out: 

• The lack of a robust institutional framework prescribing specific norms and standards; 
• The absence of monitoring mechanisms, or of the enforcement of those already in place; 
• Lack of financial resources at the national level and critical skills and expertise needed to implement WinS policies. 

Informal partnerships spring up but struggle to plug the gap

WinS project in Guatemala.
Credit: BPD

In light of this, formal and less formal institutional arrangements develop naturally at the local level, in an attempt to guarantee a basic level of WinS services. Bringing together a variety of stakeholders from the school, community, municipality and district arenas, in practice these arrangements operate as informal partnerships. 

Although some remarkably manage to achieve their objectives, most do not, which leads to the all too familiar scenario of 6-month old tapstands with broken taps and filthy toilets with broken doors or missing locks and no soap or toilet paper. As a result, teachers, parents and children lose heart, often feeling a sense of guilt, shame and helplessness. 

Promising signs of change

Advocacy efforts, increasingly coordinated and effective, are helping direct the required financial resources into WinS programmes and efforts are steadily gaining momentum in many countries. However, the question remains: How long will it be before governments are fully accountable and what can be done in the meantime? Should schools be left to their own devices following WinS interventions, or should temporary solutions be worked out with local stakeholders to sustain precious momentum? 

Are local-level partnerships a solution to sustaining WinS services and giving voice to citizens?

Let’s assume that some governments will eventually ensure good provision of services in all schools, as a result of joint efforts that will influence key institutions at the central level. Depending on the context, this may take five to ten years at best, or more in places. In the meantime, what is needed is creation and maintenance of effective partnerships at the local level. Not only should these partnerships be tasked with helping sustain improvements achieved by government or NGO-led WinS programmes - they should also play an essential advocacy role, exerting continuous pressure on local governments (who will hopefully relay that pressure upwards) to fulfil their responsibilities. It is also critical to raise parents’ awareness of the critical need for WinS, empowering them and strengthening their voice to accelerate this process.

Can a ‘partnerships toolkit’ help?

UNC WinS Workshop. Credit: BPD

BPD’s work on WinS programmes has clearly illustrated the significance of partnerships in this field. The recent evaluation of the programme 'SWASH+ Mi Escuela Saludable' in Central America for instance, has highlighted the importance of strengthening WinS partnerships at the local level, notably by clearly specifying the roles and responsibilities of the different partners, as well as ensuring compliance. 

Lack of time and finance may explain why such work has not been given more emphasis to date. Waiting for governments to act to sustain programme gains does not help these partnerships. Other obstacles include wishful thinking that local stakeholders will just work it out, and defeatism. In some cases practitioners have not had easy access to practical tools, despite their awareness of the significance of partnerships for programme sustainability. 

Against this backdrop, BPD’s experience with a wide range of WASH Multi-Stakeholder Partnerships (MSPs) and the tools and frameworks it has developed to support them appear particularly relevant. These allow partners to anticipate, prevent and solve challenges that may arise - knowledge that is instrumental in improving the formation and management of WinS partnerships at the local level. However, given the specific context of WinS work and notably, the multiplicity of actors involved, a tailored partnership-approach is needed.

In the next blog post, we will discuss the steps taken during the workshop to develop a ‘WinS partnership toolkit’, which involved:

1. Identification of WinS stakeholders at local and district levels; 
2. Assessment of stakeholders' respective incentives to be involved in WinS work; 
3. Listing stakeholders' respective potential functions. 

Make space in your timetable for the next lesson…

BPD Board Members' Blog Series: Part 3

Welcome to the third of a series of guest posts by BPD’s Board members. Please share this with others and feel free to make comments through the site or by emailing us.

There are some promising signs that the importance of partnerships is gaining recognition. 2013 has been declared “International Year of Water Cooperation” by the United Nations – a year when both the UN and Stockholm World Water Week will be highlighting the importance of partnerships and collaboration – BPD’s area of expertise. In the December issue of its Waterfront magazine, SIWI wrote that “Cooperation between actors in different sectors is essential for proper water development and management...”

In this third edition of our Board Blog, Lajana Manandhar, of NGO Lumanti Support Group for Shelter, highlights how a Nepali national daily newspaper profiled the importance of such cooperation. Drawing on a case study from Kathmandu, it illustrates how partnership can even act as a bridge across political divides.

Partnership bridges the political divide

BPD Board member
Lajana Manandhar
Credit:
End Water Poverty

In September 2012, leading Nepali national daily newspaper Kantipur wrote a telling piece about one of Lumanti’s water projects that involved two village development committees. What was revealing was that Kantipur did not highlight the technical or financial details of the project such as design, system, production, tariff, source of funds etc. Instead, it focused on the partnership work that was needed among the multiple political parties represented in the community to make this water project a success.

Water services in a rapidly changing environment 
The project took place in Tokha, northern Kathmandu, 14km from the heart of the capital. The community had been suffering from an acute shortage of water, as had many parts of the Kathmandu Valley. Government taps had been dry for many years and the only source of drinking water was the taps installed by Plan International nearly 18 years earlier. A committee had been set up for the management of this free, communal water supply system. The rapid urbanization that is taking place in Tokha and the change of lifestyle from one of a typical farming village into that of a growing town, has led to high per capita consumption of water. Demand has also shifted from communal to private taps, which has started a hot debate on whether or not water should be free.

New political divisions
In Tokha, people have a high level of political awareness. They are known as fierce political activists and have been very active in politics for the last few decades. (In the past, people in Tokha had only one political agenda – to establish a multi-party democracy in Nepal, as opposed to the single monarchy system.) The establishment of democracy has seen the introduction of many political parties, which has led to division according to personal political beliefs. This political feeling has spilled over and become a hindrance to community development programmes. 

United by a desire to develop the community
The role of support organisations was therefore critical to the water project in Tokha, which was implemented by Lumanti, with support from UN Habitat. Patience and time was needed to help the community’s political party representatives to understand that if they wanted to address the water problems of Tokha, there was no other way than to come together and work collectively. The user committee that was established brought together members of all the key political parties and the good governance of this committee managed to close the political divide, leading to successful completion of the project. The Kantipur article concluded by stating the community leaders’ views, that they would not let the differences of national level party opinions prevail and hinder the local development programme. They realised that, in the end, political parties are united by a desire to contribute to development of the community and the nation. 

That a leading newspaper thought to write a piece with a focus on collaboration and partnership effort is recognition of its importance: As we well know at BPD, there is indeed no other way to succeed than to work together in partnership at all levels, for the benefit of the community as a whole.

11th Sanitation Community of Practice (SanCoP) Meeting: Learning from Failure in Sanitation

by Aliki Zeri for BPD Water and Sanitation 

The main river crossing in Kibera slum, Nairobi
Credit: BPD Water and Sanitation

What do we mean when we talk about ‘failure’? How can NGOs in the development sector and in particular in the field of sanitation, use ‘failure’ as a learning mechanism? Is it prudent to ‘market’ ‘failure’ and if so is there a right way of doing it? 

These were just a few of the questions the 11th SanCop, which was held on the 14th of November 2012 at WEDC (Loughborough University), strived to answer. ‘Strive’ appears undoubtedly to be the right word, since after considerable debate a number of issues still remained unanswered. And although this may be perceived by some as a ‘failure’, for me it represents a clear indication of the meeting’s success. Bringing together more that 40 academics, engineers, NGO representatives and sanitation experts the meeting provided a ‘safe space’ where ‘failure’ was recognised and embraced as part of the development-aid organisations’ learning curve. 

Is there a difference between ‘lessons learnt’ and ‘admitting failure’?
‘Failure’, ‘lessons learnt’, ‘learning opportunities’ and ‘learning return’ were used interchangeably by participants throughout the debate; illustrating the difficulty of defining the precise context and the ambit of this concept. Is in fact the term ‘lessons learnt’ radically different from the term ‘admitting failure’? Participants appeared to think so. The former was perceived as indicating a backward-looking process, a mechanism of revisiting a project/programme and assessing what went wrong. On the contrary, an ‘admission of failure’ is associated with a process of learning which is embedded within the project’s/programme’s structure, allowing implementers to constantly re-assess the project/programme and adapt it to changing and often unforeseen circumstances. 

Reassessing perceptions of failure
Within this context participants were implicitly prompted to reassess their perceptions of ‘failure’. The commonly shared understanding that, a failed project or programme means that potential beneficiaries are no worse off than they were before the intervention took place, was accordingly challenged. The need to “reframe the public image of development”  (traditionally perceived as something that is inherently benign and could therefore have no negative effect) was commonly agreed.  

Incentives and disincentives of recognising failure 
Having recognised the malleability of ‘failure’ as a concept, participants shifted their attention to the incentives and disincentives of recognising ‘failures’ - the fear of displeasing donors and the associated ‘competition for a piece of the donor pie’  appeared to be the main concerns. Could EWB Canada’s ‘safe spaces’ counteract these disincentives? And more generally could they provoke a fundamental change in the ‘donor culture’, one that would result in donors not only actively promoting an honest reflection of what is not working, but also rewarding NGOs that are openly admitting their failures? 

The dilemma of marketing failure in WASH
Building a ‘safe space’ across the development sector (the WASH sector included) is unarguably challenging; expanding this ‘space’ outside this limit is expected to be even more difficult. ‘Marketing failure in WASH’ was the title BPD Water and Sanitation chose for its discussion group. Is it indeed advisable or even prudent for NGOs to ‘market’ (i.e. communicate) their ‘failures’ to the public? Could Bellemare’s cynical argument that: “admitting failure is the not-for-profit world equivalent of corporate social responsibility in the for-profit world”  be the answer to this question? As Terence  argues: “if you’re the first NGO trying to do it you’ll find yourself at the sharp end of a ‘first penguin to leap off the ice sheet’ type collective action dilemma (i.e. it’s the first penguin that has the highest chance of getting chomped by the sea lions). Who’s going to keep giving money to the one NGO that’s forever feeding journalists with stories of what it did wrong?”  Even though there is some truth in this argument, it is equally true that:  “the more people who are honest about how challenging the work is and how rife it is with failures - not because of incompetence but because we are courageously taking on some of the most complex and dynamic problems- the more the public will see the admission of failure as a sign of transparency, humility and learning/innovation cultures and not as a sign of weakness.” 

An encouraging first step in the ‘development-aid failure’ debate 
Acknowledging the novelty of the issue and the breadth of arguments that could be raised within each of the aforementioned themes is unarguably the first step in engaging the sanitation sector with the ‘development-aid failure’ debate. Taking this first step within the context of the 11th SanCop, was for me a particularly challenging, yet fulfilling experience. The high-level of discourse, the enthusiasm and commitment of all participants, not only during the formal sessions but also during the breaks and the group-discussions was indeed admirable. In this sense, the participants’ promise to revisit the issue in the future SanCops was particularly encouraging. 

For examples of 'failure' in sanitation and also water projects, see this ongoing blog from Improve International.

Read more about Sanitation Community of Practice (SanCoP)

BPD Board Members' Blog Series: Part 2

Welcome to the second of a series of guest posts by BPD’s Board members. Please share this with others and feel free to make comments through the site or by emailing us.

How to couple ‘innovation’ with the realpolitik of local level implementation?   

by Darren Saywell, BPD Board Member and WASH/CLTS Technical Director at PLAN International USA

Do all development sectors suffer from the constant search for the (Holy) Grail, the ‘silver bullet’ that will bring transformational change to everyday implementation? I suspect so; it being part of human nature to challenge expectations and question norms.

Currently, the Grail for the WASH sector is how to achieve ‘scale’ (scaling-up, or if this is anathema to your instincts, operating at scale) and accelerated change. At times it seems we are awash with examples from other sectors achieving huge leaps and bounds in coverage by thinking and doing differently. Consider the often quoted examples of mobile telephony in Africa as a metaphor for innovation or large scale conditional cash transfers in the health sector to alter the incentives for large scale behavior change.

In the bewildering array of new information being released in the sector (I blame Twitter and, ahem, bloggers), I observe a trend towards what I would call ‘disruptive influence’; the clarion call of individuals and organizations who argue for bold, radical, fearless, revolutionary scale thinking as a way to deliver change in the sector.

The basic idea is that we need to ‘disrupt’ normal thinking to shake ourselves out of a collective WASH stupor. These calls are typically accompanied by excellent marketing, attractive imagery and articulate and charismatic spokespeople that seduce us easily. Perhaps this is the modern day equivalent of paradigm shifts compressed into a 30 second Youtube video, a mobile phone app or brightly colored infographic.

I doubt that it will do my career any good to be cast as a naysayer to bright and bold ideas, and this blog is not advocating for conventional approaches and a return to almost glacial-length timelines for the achievement of international development goals. Like everyone, I passionately want WASH programs and outcomes to be more widespread, accessible to all and sustainable for everyone. And I want it now.

My main point is how do we best couple advocates of disruptive influence with the realpolitik of local level implementation? This trend needs to acknowledge the challenges. Local champions already struggle to translate policy level rhetoric into action and maintain it over time. They fight to adopt new standards and norms in regulation that allow engineers to innovate with technology that serves the vulnerable and marginalized better. We need to understand that the sector is woefully understaffed and that the supply side of bringing new capacity into WASH is one that simply takes time to achieve.

There is inter-dependence and synergy here that the WASH sector must grasp. Disruptive influence without continued analysis/diagnostics is an empty and futile exercise, one which will ultimately be prone to failure and disappointment.

My best answer to this may appear blindingly obvious, but this doesn’t make it any less relevant – disruptive influencers are key in building our upstream constituency in the High Level Meetings and High Level Panels of the day. We will continue to need their sharpness and savoir-faire in turning heads and keeping resources focused on our sector. At the same time, we need the continued analytics and diagnostics for the sector – BPD’s constant and comprehensive learning is a great example – that informs us of tried and tested approaches, signals promising paths ahead and warns us of pitfalls on the road.

BPD Board Members' Blog Series: Part 1

Welcome to the first of a series of guest posts by BPD’s Board members, which we hope you will enjoy over the coming year. Please share this with others who may be interested and feel free to make comments through the site or by email to info[at]bpdws.org.

Conflict and collaboration - water resources in Angola’s post-war cities

by Allan Cain, Director, Development Workshop (an Angolan NGO)

After more than four decades of war, Angola has been in the recovery phase since 2002. The war resulted in mass displacement of people, destruction of infrastructure, and diversion of investments away from maintenance and infrastructure development, which have produced chronic public health problems. In addition, social exclusion, inequality and poverty - problems that originally seeded the conflict - are still rife in the post-war era.

Access to water through informal vendors

Informal water provider in Angola
Credit: Tim Hetherington

Access to water reflects the biased distribution pattern of other resources in Angola. The majority of low-income, urban communities still have no permanent access to affordable potable water and are mainly served by informal water vendors. In  Development Workshop's more than thirty years' experience of implementing practical projects in Angola, it has gathered a lot of knowledge on the functioning of this informal water economy that continues to provide the bulk of water services to the population of Luanda, the country’s capital. DW estimates that the annual value of the informal water economy has grown from about US$60 million during the war to almost US$250 million in 2012. 

Turning community conflict over water into collaboration

In this environment of uneven and inequitable access to scarce urban water resources, conflict born out of competition for access to water is inevitable. However, poor communities in Luanda have found collective solutions and built on neighbourhood cooperation and social solidarity to improve their access. These experiences demonstrate the important role that community water management can play in promoting a more equitable distribution of water resources at affordable prices in the poor peri-urban musseque settlements of the city.

Relationships as a ‘currency’ for water

In such an environment, neighbourhood water access and prices are not determined solely by commercial factors - social relationships and community solidarity play an important role. For example, householders who possess a water tank are in a position to choose not only the price but also the neighbours to whom they wish to sell. The price of water often varies, depending on the relationship between the owner of the tank and the buyer, often being lower for people with whom they have built a relationship or mutual solidarity (Lindblom, 2010).

However, home water tank owners do not always have sufficient capital on hand to buy a truckload of water every time their tank becomes empty. Until they can accumulate such a lump sum, they may themselves become consumers of water from other tank owners in the neighbourhood. Social networks evolve locally among neighbours, who may be both buyers and sellers at different times. It thus becomes essential for each water consumer in a poor, unserviced musseque to maintain amicable social relationships with a range of water suppliers within walking distance of their homes.

The above post is an abstract from a chapter of a forthcoming book by Allan Cain. Please email BPD at info[at]bpdws.org for further details.