van der Voorn, T.; Quist, J. Analysing the Role of Visions, Agency, and Niches in Historical Transitions in Watershed Management in the Lower Mississippi River. Water2018, 10, 1845.
van der Voorn, T.; Quist, J. Analysing the Role of Visions, Agency, and Niches in Historical Transitions in Watershed Management in the Lower Mississippi River. Water 2018, 10, 1845.
van der Voorn, T.; Quist, J. Analysing the Role of Visions, Agency, and Niches in Historical Transitions in Watershed Management in the Lower Mississippi River. Water2018, 10, 1845.
van der Voorn, T.; Quist, J. Analysing the Role of Visions, Agency, and Niches in Historical Transitions in Watershed Management in the Lower Mississippi River. Water 2018, 10, 1845.
Abstract
This paper analyses six major transitions in watershed management in the Lower Mississippi River from the early 19th century till present. A conceptual framework is developed for analysing the role of visions, agency and niches in water management transitions and applied to a historical case on water management in the Lower Mississippi River. It is shown that water management regimes change over time and that major transitions were preceded by niches, in which new visions were developed and empowered. The case shows that: (i) emerging visions play an important role in guiding transitions; (ii) agency enables the further diffusion of visions and niches; (iii) vision champions play an important role in transitions, but are not decisive; (iv) each transition has led to an extension of the number of societal functions provided, which has led to more complex water management regimes in which functions are combined and integrated; and (v) external landscape factors are important, as they can lead to awareness and urgency in important decision making processes.
Keywords
transitions; water management regimes; niches; visions; agency;
Subject
Environmental and Earth Sciences, Environmental Science
Copyright:
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.