Bolivia 'Water War' - Part 3

 

Even though there were various actors involved in the conflict, it all came down to two contradictory fronts: the ones that wanted to treat water as an economic good and the others that emphasized the sacred value of water and regarded access to it as a human right without monetary cost.

The Bolivian government and the private corporations Bechtel and Aguas del Tunari acted under the assumption that water is a commodity. They saw a market-based water sector reform as the only way to face the water crisis (Bakker 2010:2). Following the framework of 'green neoliberalism', they adopted the idea that “corporate management can improve service and enhance conservation of scarce resources, while bringing in healthy profits” (Fabricant 2013:132). The idea behind their action was not necessarily to take care of the lower class citizen, but to push the Bolivian economy. They wanted to ensure more market competition and, therefore, increase wealth in the country and solve environmental problems. They believed market power would balance the demand and supply of water on its own – something that the government had 'failed' to achieve.

On the other side, the Bolivian citizen and their various protest groups were committed to the 'water as common good' approach that emphasized its environmental and social value. Especially, the indigenous population of the Andean highlands was certain that water is sacred (Bakker 2010:167). In their eyes, the privatization process gave economic elites illegitimate control over water, which is such an essential part of human life. According to the Bolivian citizen, privatization went against water equity (fairness in pricing and access to services) (Bakker 2010:140). They accused Bechtel and Aguas del Tunari of not acting in favor of the citizen but for the company's stockholders. Behind the specific protests against the water privatization in Cochabamba stood also a general distrust of the 'neo-liberal turn' in the country and its assumed economic oppression. Oscar Olivera, one of the spokespersons for the Coordinator for the Defense of Water and Life, said in an interview: “We want democracy. We want a government that takes our opinion seriously. We want a government that doesn't just take into account the interests of international financiers and their neoliberal agenda” (Multinational Monitor 2000:19).

 

Bakker, Karen. Privatizing Water. Governance Failure and the World's Urban Water Crisis. Cornell University Press: Ithaca and London. 2010. Print.

Fabricant, Nicole; Hicks, Kathryn. Bolivia's Next Water War. Historicizing the Struggles over Access to Water Resources in the Twenty-First Century. In: Radical History Review. Issue 116. Spring 2013. MARHO:The Radical Historians' Organization. PDF.

Multinational Monitor. The Fight for Water and Democracy. An Interview with Oscar Olivera. Essential Information: Washington, DC. June 2000. PDF. pp. 15-19.