Aaron Ansell. Zero Hunger: Political Culture and Antipoverty Policy in Northeast Brazil. Chapel Hill, The University of North Carolina Press, 2014. 239 p. Anexos, referências bibliográficas, índice remissivo, ilustrações. ISBN 978-1-46961397-0 .
<em>In many regions of the world, the multiple uses of transboundary fresh water have been a critically important component for regional stability. This situation explains why, in many cases, water management has commonly become linked to national security concerns. But, in what intensity? In search for answers, we analyze the cases of Southern Africa and the Jordan River Basin due to their prevailing condition of hydrological stress. To verify the role played by governance mechanisms in accommodating the interests of riparian states, the Hydropolitical Complexes model was applied in a comparative perspective. Our findings suggest a trend towards cooperation in Southern Africa due to the successful institutionalization of management mechanisms capable of minimizing potential conflicts. In the Jordan Basin, however, the struggle for control of water resources has been a paramount feature in the maintenance of a tense and resilient non-cooperative framework among riparian countries.</em>
Droughts followed by famines were common in Brazil, mainly in Northeast Brazil, until the 1980s and were frequently devastating, destroying livelihoods. A succession of droughts resulted in harvest failure, triggering famines in some cases. Famine-like conditions prevailed mainly in the 1877-79 Grande Seca (Great Drought), in which many died of malnutrition-related causes. In subsequent droughts, famine-like conditions reoccurred, but the extent of starvation-induced deaths declined to almost zero. Do only available political theories and known natural and socio-political factors, such as climate, topography, and market viability, provide sufficient data to investigate the causes of the drought of 1877-1879? The author concludes that there is little or no research, accumulated knowledge and information on the possible factors that satisfactorily explain why the drought and famine episodes were so impactful in that period.
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