CNDS fellow discusses significance of water management in Dagens Nyheter
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Together with seven other experts, CNDS fellow Christine Wamsler wrote an article for DN DEBATT raising the issue of the need to reform Swedish water governance and management in light of the newly proposed national climate adaptation strategy.
The debate article was initiated in response to the proposal from the Swedish Government to the Swedish Parliament on a national climate adaptation strategy (Proposition ”Nationell strategi för klimatanpassning”) which was submitted on 8 March 2018. This strategy builds upon existing governance of water management, which in the opinion of the authors to the DN debate article will actually contribute to more economic losses and damages from flooding as well as increased water scarcity.
Floods are often presented as a climate change issue or mentioned in discussions on the need for greater protection against extreme weather events. Yet other important causes of increasing floods are often forgotten; for example, how we use the land and where we build human structures. Unfortunately, there are major problems with water management today, and consequently this sometimes results in the fact that new problems are created instead of prevented.
The authors also argue that Swedish climate change adaptation is focusing too much on local and ”hard” solutions. Another problem they identify is that the municipalities do not have sufficient support in terms of norms and goals. Therefore, they argue for reform. In efforts to address such problems, the experts suggest a number of concrete suggestions for tackling some of the obstacles, including increased collaboration between key actors, creating more space for water in urban landscapes, and strengthening the coordinating governance capacity at the national level.