Program in Water Conflict Management and Transformation

PWCMT Co-Director Dr. Aaron Wolf recently participated in a briefing to the UN General Assembly on the economics of water, climate, conflict and cooperation, and early warning for pandemic preparedness. The informal briefing offered scientific decision support for Member States to contribute to the UN 2023 Water Conference in March 2024, the pandemic preparedness negotiations, and preparations for the SDG Summit in September 2023. A video of the entire briefing is available here. Dr.

December 9, 2022

January 15, 2022

November 29, 2021

November 19, 2021

Program Co-Director Dr. Aaron Wolf was joined by Dr. Peter Gleick, co-founder of the Pacific Institute, in a discussion on the potential linkages between water, climate change, and conflict. Moderated by Dr. Susanne Schmeier of IHE-Delft, the video is part of the larger K4D Water Security Learning Journey led by the Institute of Development Studies at the University of Sussex. Drs. Wolf and Gleick discuss different opportunities and challenges for water conflict and diplomacy from the sub-national to transboundary scales.

Program Co-Director Lynette de Silva has taken a new look at the Vanport disaster of 1948 through the lens of transformative conflict analysis. In 1948, the community of Vanport, Oregon, home to a large Black community, was washed away by a historic flood event. In her new research, de Silva tests the utility of the transformative water conflict analysis framework in the Vanport context by constructing a situation map and placing the Vanport story into one of the four stages of water conflict transformation.

The Hydropolitical Tension and Institutional Vulnerability Datasets have been posted on Resource Watch and the Water, Peace, and Security (WPS) website. This data was calculated by the TFDD as part of the Transboundary Water Assessment Programme's River Basin Component. Using this data it is possible to map the relative risk category for hydropolitical tension at the basin and basin country unit level. The risk of hydropolitical tension is determined by the level of institutional vulnerability and level of hazard due to water infrastructure development.

January 28, 2020
The University of Arizona's Udall Center for Studies in Public Policy has become the latest member of the Universities Partnership for Water Cooperation and Diplomacy (UPWCD), an international network of research institutions that strives to advance the field of water cooperation and diplomacy, A recent publication by Udall Center researchers, "U.S.-Mexico Hydrodiplomacy: Foundations, change, and future challenges, is highlighted on the UPWCD website as an example of the Udall Center's focus on water diplomacy within the U.S.-Mexico border region.

January 21, 2020
Researchers at King's College, London and Michigan Technological University have developed the GlObal geOreferenced Database of Dams (GOODD), a global dataset of more than 38,000 georeferenced dams. GOODD will enable improved global analyses of the impact dams have on society and the environment, and also advances understanding of the effect of environmental change on dam cactchments.
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