Work package 4
WP4: Developing Mechanisms for Inclusive and Adaptive Participation
Traditional, centralized approaches to water governance are often insufficient for today’s complex challenges. As a result, collaborative governance has become critical, with basin organizations serving as the primary platforms for bringing diverse actors together. However, collaboration is not automatically successful; it requires carefully designed participation mechanisms to ensure inclusiveness, foster consensus, and avoid reinforcing existing power imbalances. When done right, participation can lead to better cooperation, social learning, and enhanced adaptive capacity, which are essential for innovation and resilience. This work package aims to assess, compare, and develop recommendations for participation mechanisms that create inclusive and adaptive basin councils in Chile.
WP 4.1: Evaluation of International Participatory Experiences
This first stage will build a foundation by learning from global best practices. The methodology involves an extensive literature review on participation in environmental decisions and collaborative contexts. This will be complemented by a multiple-case study analysis of four international water basin organizations in Uruguay, Brazil, the US, and Spain. By examining these diverse cases, which have long histories of collaboration, the goal is to identify different strategies for fostering inclusive and adaptive participation. The findings will be compiled into a set of "Participation Recommendations".
WP 4.2: Identifying Barriers to Participation in the Chilean Context
Effective participation practices cannot be simply transferred from one context to another, as local social and ecological dimensions are crucial for success. Therefore, this stage will explore the specific barriers to user participation in three different Chilean water basins. These basins will be selected to represent a diversity of collaborative histories: one with a long history of organization, one with a more recent trajectory, and one with no previous history of water user organizations. Information will be collected through in-depth interviews and active participation to identify contextual barriers, such as divergent expectations, unclear rules, or the physical and social characteristics of each basin.
WP 4.3: Towards Inclusive and Adaptive Participation in the Chilean Context
This final stage will synthesize the knowledge gathered from the previous stages—the international recommendations (WP4.1) and the analysis of Chilean challenges (WP4.2)—along with results from the other Work Packages. The primary output will be a report with tailored recommendations for designing effective participation processes in Chilean water basin organizations. These recommendations will be discussed and validated with key stakeholders, including officials from the Ministry of Environment, the General Water Directorate, and members of the pilot water basins, to ensure they are practical and relevant for strengthening an adaptive approach to water management in Chile.