Water justice and Europe’s Right2Water movement

van den Berge J.; Vos J.; Boelens R. · International Journal of Water Resources Development (2022) · DOI: 10.1080/07900627.2021.1898347

Resumen

In 2013 the European Citizens’ Initiative (ECI) ‘Right2Water’ collected 1.9 million signatures across Europe against water privatization. It became the first ever successful ECI and has built a Europe-wide movement. Right2Water sought for Europe’s legal enforcement of the Human Right to Water and Sanitation (HRWS) as a strategic political tool to challenge European Union market policies. The paper examines the ECI from a social movement perspective. Although the European Commission subscribed that ‘water is a public good, not a commodity’, its implementation is subject to continuing politics and socio-political struggle, with growing urgency in times of the Covid-19 pandemic crisis.

Instituciones: Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú