Contested Urban Waterscapes
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Contested Urban Waterscapes: Water, Power and Urban Fragmentation in Medellín, Colombia Dissertation zur Erlangung des akademischen Grades Doktor der Naturwissenschaften (Dr. rer. nat.) eingereicht im Fachbereich Geowissenschaften der Freien Universität Berlin vorgelegt von Diana Marcela López Rivera Berlin, 2015 Erstgutachterin: Prof. Dr. Dörte Segebart Fachbereich Geowissenshcaften/ Institut für Geographische Wissenschaften Fachrichtung Antopogeography Freie Universität Berlin Malteserstr. 74-100 D-12249 Berlin Zweitgutachter: Univ.-Prof. Dr. Martin Coy Institut für Geographie Universität Innsbruck Innrain 52 A-6020 Innsbruck Tag der Disputation: 14. Juli 2015 ABSTRACT This research explores how access to water has become a crucial terrain over which market-driven logics are both consolidated and contested. Drawing on case study research conducted in Medellín, Colombia, this study investigates the paradoxical situation of rapid emergence of the city's water company as a multilatina (regional multinational company) on the one hand, and the increasing number of households disconnected from the formal water supply networks particularly in low-income areas, on the other hand. By bringing together work on urban political ecology and neoliberalisation of nature, this dissertation illustrates not only how neoliberal principles constitute uneven urban waterscapes based on particular arrangements of nature, society and urban infrastructure, but also how the materiality of water challenges these new socio-natural configurations. Going beyond mainstream assumptions that narrowly interpret water disconnection as a result of inability to pay or as a technical-managerial problem, I argue that a complex interplay between water scarcity discourses, notions of citizenship and technological infrastructures deployed by the water company has become utterly instrumental to the production and reproduction of water inequalities. For disconnected households in particular, much is at stake as these socio-nature configurations determine not only how their lives will be affected but also how alternatives and solutions can be mobilized and implemented. A conceptual triad of nature, society and urban infrastructure emerging through the simultaneous process of commodification and decommodification is introduced to address two key questions that will successively structure my analysis. First, to what extend have neoliberal reforms changed the management and ideological practices of Medellín’s water utility company, and with what economic, social, spatial and environmental implications? Second, how do disconnected households perceive, experience and resist those transformations and how do they employ particular practices to secure access to water on an everyday basis? A combination of historical and multi-scale analysis is deployed as a methodological tool to investigate the effects of commercialization on intensifying Medellín’s water inequalities. An historical perspective illustrates how the form and shape of the urban waterscape reflects the profound changes in the managerial and ideological interests of the water company while a multi-scale analysis provides insights into how relations of power are enacted by looking into actor’s diversified strategies to access and gain control over the flows of water. The research methods used to gather the information for this study involved the analysis of archives, official publications and i media material of the Water Company. This is combined with primary data derived from in-depth and semi-structured interviews, household surveys, local media reports and participant observation. This research seeks to make a contribution to the current academic debates over neoliberalism in urban geography by investigating how public companies operating under market-oriented reforms deploy particular material, discursive and institutional practices to produce and reproduce water inequalities. Furthermore, it seeks to advance understandings of the materiality of water in order to find out how water’s biophysical, spatial, symbolic and discursive aspects can come to influence everyday practices in low- income areas and contribute to current debates on alternatives to commercialization. ii TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT .......................................................................................................... i! TABLE OF CONTENTS ........................................................................................ iii! ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ........................................................................................ vi! LIST OF TABLES ............................................................................................... viii! LIST OF FIGURES .............................................................................................. ix! ABBREVIATIONS AND ACRONYMS .................................................................... xi! CHAPTER 1!Contested Urban Waterscapes: Medellín, Colombia ......................... 1! 1.1 Introduction ................................................................................................ 1! 1.2 Conceptualizing inequalities in a neoliberal urban waterscape ............................ 6! 1.3 Research methodology: Tracing flows of water and flows of capital ................... 11! 1.3.1 Medellín: A city between innovation and inequalities ................................. 11! 1.3.2 Methodological approach and methods .................................................... 12! 1.3.3 Fieldwork phases ................................................................................. 17! 1.4 Structure of the thesis ................................................................................ 26! CHAPTER 2!Water, Power and Urban Fragmentation ....................................... 28! 2.1 Introduction .............................................................................................. 28! 2.2 The Urbanization of water ........................................................................... 29! 2.2.1 Nature, society and infrastructure in the city ........................................... 30! 2.3 Governing urban natures ............................................................................ 41! 2.3.1 Governance and citizenship ................................................................... 42! 2.3.2 Neoliberalisation of the natural environment ............................................ 45! 2.4 A framework to analyse contested urban waterscapes ..................................... 54! 2.5 Conclusions: Constructing uneven urban waterscapes ..................................... 57 CHAPTER 3!EPM a Vital Source of Welfare and Progress:!Municipalization (1955- 1990) .............................................................................................................. 58! 3.1 Introduction .............................................................................................. 58! 3.2 Water, a diffuse frontier between the public and the private ............................ 59! 3.3 Water, a resource for securing urban modernization ....................................... 63! 3.4 Water, a resource to be dominated by engineers ............................................ 67! 3.5 Water, a resource for maintaining urban social order ...................................... 70! 3.6 Water, a resource for furthering ecological expansion ..................................... 75! 3.7 Conclusion: The consolidation of the water, power and capital nexus ................ 78! iii CHAPTER 4!EPM Closer to the World: Commercialization (1991-present) ........ 80! 4.1 Introduction .............................................................................................. 80! 4.2 Water, a source of economic growth ............................................................. 80! 4.3 Water, a source of socio-spatial fragmentation and differentiation .................... 83! 4.4. Water, a source for conquering the Latin American Market ............................. 87! 4.5 Water, a source of revenue for the Municipality of Medellín .............................. 91! 4.6 Water, a source to enhance aesthetic and environmental values ....................... 94! 4.7 Water, a source to differentiate between “good” and “bad” citizens ................... 96! 4.8 Conclusion: The transnationalization of the water, power and capital nexus ....... 99! CHAPTER 5!The State: Deepening Contradictions in Water Service Provision 101! 5.1 Introduction ............................................................................................ 101! 5.2 Neoliberal cost-recovery strategies ............................................................. 102! 5.2.1 Water pricing .................................................................................... 103! 5.2.2 Cross-subsidization ............................................................................ 105! 5.2.3 Unaccounted for water ....................................................................... 107! 5.2.4 Disconnection for non-payment ........................................................... 112! 5.2.5 Prepaid systems ................................................................................ 113! 5.2.6 Water as a scarce commodity .............................................................. 115! 5.3 The right to urban water ........................................................................... 118! 5.4 Bridging the gap: Balancing social, environmental and economic responsibility