Captured, drained, dammed, channelled, tamed by two centuries of modernity, water rebels, erupts in torrential floods in the Alpine valleys, submerges the plains of Hauts-de-France or the streets of Marseille, and leaves the Pyrénées-Orientales. From successive floods to episodes of drought, from the degradation of watersheds to pollution by so-called “eternal” pollutants, crises follow one another and fuel tensions.
If fresh water has always been a source of rivalry, global warming and the industrialisation of land have exacerbated conflicts. In the Marais Poitevin, opposition to mega-basins and the agricultural irrigation model is not wavering; in Vittel (Vosges), Volvic (Puy-de-Dôme), Grigny (Essonne) or Montagnac (Hérault), residents denounce the privatisation of sources for the benefit of multinationals Nestlé or Coca-Cola; in Hérault, the construction of a golf course is arousing resistance, while in Wittelsheim (Haut-Rhin), it is the permanent burial of toxic waste near Alsatian groundwater that is mobilising elected officials and residents.
These groups challenge privatisation and attacks on the water cycle, that vast circuit that, through soils and wetlands, rivers and oceans, allows for its renewal. But they also criticise the way decisions are made and the race for technical solutions even before collective reflection has determined priorities. Often accompanied by researchers, they advocate that the needs of waterways should no longer be considered as a variable for adapting human activities. At the crossroads of life sciences and social sciences, they explore the interdependencies between aquatic environments and the living beings that populate them, experimenting locally with new forms of governance.
“Clientelist drift”
Even within the institutions responsible for resource distribution, many actors are suffering from a hangover. While a series of reforms have weakened the pillars of environmental democracy in the name of streamlining procedures, the deliberative bodies for water management are not spared. Since the agricultural demonstrations at the beginning of the year, the commitments patiently woven by the members of the National Water Committee (CNE), the body responsible for advising the government, have been stored away in the cupboards of the Ministry of Agriculture, eager to restore peace in the countryside. “We spent hours weighing every word of the CNE’s ruling on the Ecophyto plan on pesticides, and the government did not take it into account by negotiating directly with the FNSEA”regrets Florence Denier-Pasquier, jurist member of the CNE and administrator of the France Nature Environnement association, denouncing “a clientelist drift”.
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