CAS SEE Seminars with Guests: Alma Midžić on “The Ways of Water: Commodity, Public Good, Common Resource” in conversation with the RECAS Fellow Boriša Mraović

Many people are already experiencing water shortages; conflicts over water are not unknown, and the situation is exacerbated by climate change. However, there is still a low level of awareness regarding the limited supplies of freshwater resources. Access to drinking water is often taken for granted without considering distribution and management, and without acknowledging the not-so-bright forecasts for the availability of this resource in the future. Some estimates suggest that the world will face a global water deficit of 40% by 2030. The pressure on the resource is enormous due to the use for water supply, agriculture and industry, mining, the increasing use for energy purposes, and pollution. Recently, there has been an increasing demand to commercialize this common good, despite numerous instances of mismanagement following the privatization of water supply services, mainly through public-private partnerships. In this presentation, Alma Midžić will discuss two dominant models of water management – private and public – in relation to the practice of commoning. She’ll refer to the example of the water supply system in Luke, which is a case of a semi-legal water distribution system governed by the entire local community.