How shifts in societal priorities link to reform in agricultural water management: Analytical framework and evidence from Germany, India and Tanzania

Climate change, environmental awareness, and food security are just some of the new priorities societies pursue. Due to the very large influence of agriculture on water quantity and quality, often a certain degree of reform in agricultural water management is required to accommodate such new priorities. To assess the degree of reform an analytical framework is introduced to account for social (e.g. contestation, path dependency) and biophysical limitations (water balance as a zero-sum game, limited gains in biomass productivity) to reform in agricultural water management. The hypothesis tested in this paper is whether the framework is capable to link shifts in societal priorities to actual reform in agricultural water management and if the framework can assess to what extent agricultural water management has changed to accommodate shifting societal priorities. The analytical framework and variables assess ex-post the degree of a reorientation, which is understood as the interplay between shifts in societal priorities and reform in agricultural water management to accommodate such shifts. The framework offers a causal chain of 6 variables to assess a reorientation. A test is performed by probing the framework in diverse contexts of Germany, India and Tanzania. Evidence from Germany, India and Tanzania confirm the validity of the social and biophysical limitations as they acted as real boundaries for the amount of reform achieved. In Tanzania much reform was achieved and agricultural water management accommodated the new priority of agricultural expansion, whereas in Germany and India few farm-level changes were achieved making new priorities of environmental conservation unattainable. Based on the test it can be concluded that the framework offers a realistic lense to study reorientations around the world. For further research, in-depth case studies are recommended to further develop the framework and advance insight in the complex biophysical and social interrelationships of reorientations.