Re-Municipalization of Water Services

A Lecture in Conference Room, National Institute of Urban Affairs, 4B India Habitat Centre at 3:00 pm by Bernard Barraqué, Centre Nationale de Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), France

The presentation will begin with an examination of the public vs private debate on water in Europe over the last 150 years. The central argument that will be made is that the public vs. private debate cannot be isolated from the centralization vs. decentralization and the unbundling vs. integration debates. It will consider the importance of the links between technology innovation and changes in institutional context. The presentation will then address the history of water supply in Paris, focusing on the long-lived consequences of technical choices by Baron Haussmann, and the involvement of the Compagnie Générale des Eaux. It will then explain how and why the present mayor re-established municipal control over the service and discuss the arguments put forward to do so. The concluding part of the presentation will address a core issue that is emerging on the agenda, namely the regionalization of drinking water production, as is already the case for wastewater treatment.

Prof. Bernard Barraqué is currently full time Research Director in the CNRS, with the rank of professor. He is associated with the Centre International de Recherches sur l'Environnement et le Développement (CIRED) and was, until recently the chair of the French National Committee of the UNESCO International Hydrological Program. He is currently co-ordinating EAU&3E, a research project on the sustainability of water and sanitation services in French cities (see http://eau3e.hypotheses.org), having just completed a collaborative project on payments for ecosystem services by water utilities to farmers (EVEC, acronym for Eau des Villes, Eau des Champs). Prof. Barraqué is on the editorial boards of Water Policy, Espaces et Sociétés and Water Alternatives. His last book in English is Urban Water Conflicts published by Taylor & Francis. Prof. Barraqué who received his PhD from Paris University and Master of Urban Development from Harvard University, was initially trained as an engineer.

Organised by: This is the twenty first in a series of Urban Workshops by the Centre de Sciences Humaines (CSH) and Centre for Policy Research (CPR). These workshops seek to provoke public discussion on issues relating to the development of the city and try to address all its facets including its administration, culture, economy, society, and politics.