WP 1.2: Institutional Insertion and Articulation

WP 1.1: Water Basin Council Design

There is no one-size-fits-all solution to water challenges; governance at the basin level must be tailored to local specificities. Therefore, this work area focuses on answering fundamental questions for the effective design of water basin councils:

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• Why? To identify the challenges and gaps in water management that will be addressed with their creation.

• For what? To define the missions, functions, and objectives of these governance entities.

• Who? To determine who should be part of the councils, how they are chosen, and how they participate.

• How? To establish the necessary tools and instruments, such as financial resources, for their successful operation.

To achieve this, the methodology includes a multiple-case-study analysis of four international water basin organizations, an extensive literature review, and a workshop to transfer and validate the results with key stakeholders like the General Directorate of Water and the Ministry of the Environment.

Water basin councils cannot operate in isolation; they must be articulated with the existing institutional framework. Chile has a diversity of public and private organizations with functions related to water resources. Therefore, this second area seeks to answer how the new basin councils will relate to existing organisms and to territorial and water planning instruments, such as the Strategic Plans for Water Resources in Basins.

The methodology is based on a widespread bibliographic review and expert surveys of international cases, using the OECD's water governance principles as a reference. Additionally, four basin organizations will be analyzed to understand their institutional insertion. The results will be discussed in a workshop to develop policy proposals, which will be presented to decision-makers through policy briefs and presentations.