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About the Project
The Water Sustainability Project (WSP) began
in January of 2003 at the University of Victoria's POLIS
Project on Ecological Governance in British Columbia,
Canada. The initial focus of the project was to understand
the structure and dynamics of urban water use, and to provide
mechanisms to help reorient Canadian water management from
supply to demand-side approaches. Formerly the Urban Water
Demand Management Project (UWDM), the initiative changed its
name in 2005 to reflect a transition to promoting demand management
and ecological governance as part of the broader goal of sustainable
water management.
Practising ecological governance engages society
to create the systemic reforms required to develop sustainability.
By actively seeking ways to integrate ecosystem values and
decision-making structures and processes (i.e. markets, law
and policy, planning and management), the intent is to develop
systems that embed the notion of ecological sustainability
in government, business and industry, and civil society. This
conception of ecological governance provides a useful framework
for analysis when considering efforts aimed at sustainably
managing water resources in Canada.
In the context of “governance for innovation,”
a term that promotes the adoption of innovative and alternative
solutions, the WSP team has developed a comprehensive legal
and policy framework for urban water management and detailed
action plans for federal, provincial and municipal governments.
Overall project objectives:
To develop innovative
governance options that promote sustainable water management,
including "watershed governance" as an alternative
to centralized, hierarchical and sectoral governance approaches;
To develop water law and
policy decision-making tools that promote sustainable
water management, long-term integrative planning, and regulatory
mechanisms (including legal and institutional reform) to enable
ecologically based water allocation;
To create a national
network of experts and others interested in the new
paradigm of sustainable water management to contribute to
and use these models as practical tools for policy and institutional
change;
To continue to examine
urban and emerging water issues in Canada, including
a survey of best practices in demand-side management (DSM)
in Canada and abroad; and,
To increase public
awareness around the importance, and limits, of water in Canada,
thereby ensuring that the above happens as part of a larger
cultural change.
Research Areas
The work at WSP is divided into four focus
areas:
New
Water Infrastructure including the "social infrastructure"
of conservation policies and programs.
Demand Management
& Soft Path two complementary approaches to that move
away from the supply-side toward sustainable water management.
Watershed
Governance an emerging field of research that addresses
issues of governance in the context of water sustainability.
Water
Law a field of law that is increasingly influenced by
environmental law and Green
Legal Theory.
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