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Restoration of Urban Water Commons: Navigating Social-Ecological Fault Lines and Inequities

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Title Restoration of Urban Water Commons: Navigating Social-Ecological Fault Lines and Inequities
 
Creator Sen, A.
Unnikrishnan, H.
Nagendra, H.
 
Subject urban community
ecological restoration
 
Description The networked tank/lake system of Bengaluru has been created by human intervention, with a documented history as far back as the 9th century C.E. The construction and maintenance of the tanks was overseen by local chieftains, and supported by local communities, further managed by caste-based and gender-based systems of manual labor. With urban expansion, the lakes lost their importance as the primary sources of water, leading to large scale degradation. Land-use transformations impacted the socio-ecological commons landscape, exacerbating marginalization in nature-dependent communities such as grazers and fishers due to loss of livelihoods. State initiatives coupled with community interventions helped in revival of some lakes in the past decade, though others remain severely degraded. Privileged and underprivileged caste groups describe a very different picture of the past, demonstrating rather divergent perspectives on the way in which urbanization and lake revival has impacted their lives. Based on a case study of selected lakes in Bengaluru, we establish how social inclusions and exclusions are manifested through decision making on lake management. We also seek to understand how these hierarchies have changed in response to urbanization, with aspirations towards a rhetoric of restoration, but a focus on urban greening and recreational aesthetics in practice. The impacts of urban transition and lake revival are shaped by differing power relationships manifested within the caste hierarchy.
 
Date 2021-06-30
2021-10-19T04:13:16Z
2021-10-19T04:13:16Z
 
Type Journal Article
 
Identifier Sen, A., Unnikrishnan, H. and Nagendra, H., 2021. Restoration of urban water commons: Navigating social-ecological fault lines and inequities. Ecological Restoration, 39(1-2): 120-129. https://doi.org/10.3368/er.39.1-2.120
1543-4060
https://hdl.handle.net/10568/115499
http://er.uwpress.org/content/39/1-2/120.full.pdf
https://doi.org/10.3368/er.39.1-2.120
 
Language en
 
Rights CC-BY-4.0
Open Access
 
Format 120-129
 
Source Ecological Restoration