The water wars rationale predicts that countries will wage war to safeguard their access to water resources, especially if there is water scarcity, competitive use and the countries are enemies due to a wider conflict. Following this argument, India and Pakistan should have fought a war over the Indus basin instead of negotiating the 1960 Indus Waters Treaty. In explaining this Indo-Pakistan cooperation which is specifically over water, the critical feature that emerges is that through cooperation the countries were able to safeguard their long-term water supply. In other words, cooperation is water rational. Using the Indus basin experience, the underlying logic of the water wars rationale is questioned, in particular, the use of public statements by key decisionmakers as evidence of future water wars and is shown to be wanting.

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The Indus basin civilization (3000–1500 BC) is thought to have collapsed due to the Indus river shifting its course, and unchecked salinization of the irrigated land. Though modern irrigation practices in the Indus basin do not have to worry about the river shifting its course, a priority concern should be the basin's salt profile. Despite attempts to deal with the problem since the 1960 s, the net result is still an increasing salt balance which threatens the system's sustainability. This paper explores what it means to manage risk, and then applies these insights to a narrative history of the Indus basin. Particular focus is placed on the basin's current management since it will shape how irrigation is managed in the future. A key lesson to derive is that given the short-term nature of decision-making in the basin, any significant change has to address the political reality whereby politicians exert influence over water allocations in order to safeguard their political lives.

In managing international rivers, governments are .subject to two different boundaries. The socio-politically constmcted boundaries govemed by sovereignty and the physical boundaries imposed by the tiver's hydrology. The existence of a hydrological interdependency within an international basin means that "how" it is managed is important in constructing certainty in water supply. We compare two experiences frorn Europe and Africa to see the effect of sovereignty on the management of a basin's hydro-interdependency. Pottugal and Spain have followed a Westphalian interpretation of sovereignty in the Guadiana basin to develop their physical infrastructure unilaterally and "sever" the hydro-interdependeney. In contrast, using an operadonal interpretation of sovereignty, Guinea, Mali, Mauritania and Senegal have chosen to embrace the Senegal river's hydro-interdependency and develop it jointly. A key lesson that emerges is that the approach used determines the pattem of resilience constructed in each system.

River systems originating from the Upper Indus Basin (UIB) are dominated by runoff from snow and glacier melt and summer monsoonal rainfall. These water resources are highly stressed as huge populations of people living in this region depend on them, including for agriculture, domestic use, and energy production. Projections suggest that the UIB region will be affected by considerable (yet poorly quantified) changes to the seasonality and composition of runoff in the future, which are likely to have considerable impacts on these supplies. Given how directly and indirectly communities and ecosystems are dependent on these resources and the growing pressure on them due to ever‐increasing demands, the impacts of climate change pose considerable adaptation challenges. The strong linkages between hydroclimate, cryosphere, water resources, and human activities within the UIB suggest that a multi‐ and inter‐disciplinary research approach integrating the social and natural/environmental sciences is critical for successful adaptation to ongoing and future hydrological and climate change. Here we use a horizon scanning technique to identify the Top 100 questions related to the most pressing knowledge gaps and research priorities in social and natural sciences on climate change and water in the UIB. These questions are on the margins of current thinking and investigation and are clustered into 14 themes, covering three overarching topics of “governance, policy, and sustainable solutions”, “socioeconomic processes and livelihoods”, and “integrated Earth System processes”. Raising awareness of these cutting‐edge knowledge gaps and opportunities will hopefully encourage researchers, funding bodies, practitioners, and policy makers to address them.