Indigenous Water Rights in Comparative Law

Abstract

At the end of the 2015 Academy Award-winning film The Big Short, which explores the origins of the 2008 Global Financial Crisis, a caption notes that the Wall Street investor protagonist of the film who predicted the collapse of the United States (US) housing market would now be ‘focused on one commodity: water’. Water is sometimes described in popular culture as ‘the new oil’ or ‘more valuable than gold’. It is predicted to be the subject of increasing uncertainty, competition, conflict, and even war, as increasing demand from a growing human population and development meets reduced supply as a result of poor management, overuse, and climate change.

The Intersections of Public Rights and Private Rules: An Analysis of Human Rights in Forestry and Fisheries Certification Standards

“…Despite a long history of Indigenous-led activism, 136 Indigenous rights to traditional waters have been under-emphasized in international discourses and many domestic laws fail to account for Indigenous interests in water governance. 137 Likewise, in spite of the efforts of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO) to promote rights-based approaches for small-scale fisheries, 138 small-scale fisheries and collaborative approaches to fisheries management have achieved limited salience and uptake around the world, 139 including among conservation NGOs. 140 In sum, the patterns of human rights adherence illustrated above suggest that the underlying institutional priorities, capabilities, and reputational pressures 141 that have been found to shape NGO and corporate approaches to the stringency of environmental standards may also influence the incorporation of human rights norms.…”