Art, Communication, Culture, and Education as tools for democratizing water Politics and management in Latin America (in Portuguese, and Spanish)

his issue of the WATERLAT-GOBACIT Network’s Working Papers is a product of the Network’s Thematic Area 7 TA7–Art, Communication, Culture, and Education. TA7’s membership includes academics, students, practitioners, representatives of social movements and civil society organizations, among others. This TA focuses on artistic representations and the role of art in water-related topics that fall within our Network’s remit, including literature, music, painting, cinema, theatre, and other forms. Also, TA7 addresses the study of forms of communication dealing with water-related problems, as well as the development of communication strategies oriented at promoting awareness about water-related inequalities and injustices, and empowering local communities, social movements and other actors engaged in social struggles to democratize water Politics and management. TA7 also deals with customs, traditions, and practices, “water cultures”, some of which are as ancient as the human species, and their relationship with processes of socio-ecological transformation. Our interest includes the strengthening of cultural forms grounded on the principles of water as a common or public good, the access to water as a right, and egalitarian, democratic, inclusionary, solidary, and sustainable water cultures and practices. We are also committed to opposing the advance of individualistic, exclusionary cultural forms that tend to reduce the status of water to that of a private good, a commodity, a vehicle for the accumulation of private profit. These cultural forms also contribute to aggravating existing levels of unsustainability, with frequently irreversible effects on water sources and living beings. As its title suggests, TA7 also engages with the educational dimension of water-related Politics and management. It contributes to the critique of established forms of knowledge that tend to reproduce dominant cultures, traditions and practices in relation to water. In this regard, we produce and disseminate educational contents and techniques oriented at reversing the conditions of vulnerability and defencelessness affecting human populations in relation to water. Among other issues, we focus on the existing inequalities and injustices in the access to water and water-based services that are essential for dignified life, or the protection against threats and dangers derived from climatic events and from the negative effects of the prevailing forms of water Politics and management, which are responsible for the recurrent socioecological disasters affecting ecosystems, and the very preservation of life in the planet. 

Given its broad focus, TA7 has important linkages with other Thematic Areas. In this issue, some of the articles also contribute to topics covered by TA2 – Water and Megaprojects, and TA6 – Hydrosocial Basins, Territories, and Spaces. 

The issue features four papers presenting experiences from Argentina and Brazil.