Beyond scarcity: rethinking water, climate change and conflict in the Sudans

Beyond

scarcity:

Rethinking

water,

climate

change

and

conflict

in

the

Sudans

Jan

Selby

*,

Clemens

Hoffmann

a_{DepartmentofInternationalRelations,UniversityofSussex,BrightonBN19QN,UK} b

DepartmentofInternationalRelations,BilkentUniversity,06800Ankara,Turkey

1. Introduction

Mainstream academic and policy accounts of the relations betweenenvironmentalchangeandconflict,includingtheconflict potentialofglobalclimatechange,areusuallyorganisedaround threesetsof ideas:‘scarcity’,‘statefailure’and ‘under-develop-ment’.Scarceresourcesareenvisagedaschallenginglivelihoods, fomenting grievances and competition, and spurring civil and perhapseveninter-stateconflict.Weakstateauthorityisheldto facilitate, or do little to mitigate, the development of these dynamics.Andwidespreadpovertyandalowlevelofdevelopment areequallythoughttobecrucialcontextualfactors,onthegrounds thatresourcescarcityprimarilyaffectsthelivesofpoorpeoplein poor countries. These motifs have not gone unchallenged, of course. Scarcity discourse, in particular, has been extensively critiquedon boththeoreticalandempiricalgrounds,withsome findingscantevidence oflinks between environmental scarcity andconflict(esp.Theisen,2008),andotherscallingattentiontothe problematicpolitical agendasassociatedwith, andthenegative

consequences of, scarcity framings (Leach and Mearns, 1996; Mehta,2010).Yet‘scarcity’,‘statefailure’and‘under-development’ remain the dominant policy and academic ideas. And critical scholarshiponthesethemeshasbeenmoreorientedtocritiquing theseconstructions,especially‘scarcity’,thanproposing alterna-tivemodelsofenvironment-conflictrelations.

Thisarticleseekstoadvancejustsuchanewmodel,onboth theoreticalgroundsandthroughaqualitativehistoricalanalysisof thelinks betweenwaterandconflictin thestatesofSudanand SouthSudan.ThetwoSudans(or,priortosouthernsecessionin 2011,thesinglestateofSudan)havelongservedastextbookcases withinenvironmentalsecuritythinking.Imagesandheadlinesof drought,famineandconflictdominateWesternpublic, andtoa degreeexpert,understandingsthetwocountries.Bothchronicand environmentalshock-inducedwaterscarcitiesareoftenidentified asimportantcontributoryfactorstotheirhighlevelsofpolitical violence(Assal,2006;Bromwich,2009). AndSudan isregularly portrayedassiteoftheworld’sfirstglobalclimatechange-induced war,inthetroubledwesternregionofDarfur(Mazo,2010,pp.73– 86;Mjøs,2007).SudangenerallyandDarfurspecificallyareoften heldupasprovidingparadigm-definingevidenceofourlooming futureofclimatechange-inducedconflicts.‘LetDarfurstandasthe starkestofwarningsaboutwhatthefuturecouldbring,’claimsone report(ChristianAid,2007,p.2).Moreover,bothoftheSudansare

ARTICLE INFO Articlehistory: Received23April2013

Receivedinrevisedform6January2014 Accepted8January2014

Availableonline21February2014 Keywords: Water Conflict Climatechange Scarcity Sudan ABSTRACT

This article develops a new framework for understanding environment-conflict relations, on both theoreticalgroundsandthroughaqualitativehistoricalanalysisofthelinksbetweenwaterandconflictin thestatesofSudanandSouthSudan.Theoretically,thearticlecritiquesthedominantemphaseson ‘scarcity’,‘state failure’and ‘under-development’ withindiscussionsof environmental security, and proposesanalternativemodelofenvironment-conflictrelationscentringonresourceabundanceand globally-embeddedprocessesofstate-buildinganddevelopment.Empirically,itexaminesthreeclaimed (orpossible)linkagesbetweenwaterandconflictintheSudans:overtrans-boundarywatersoftheNile; overthelinksbetweeninternalresourcescarcitiesandcivilconflict;andovertheinternalconflictimpacts ofwaterabundanceanddevelopment.Wefindthatthereexistsonlylimitedevidenceinsupportofthefirst twooftheselinkages,but plentifulevidence thatwaterabundance,and state-directedprocessesof economicdevelopmentandinternalcolonisationrelatingtowater,havehadviolentconsequences.We concludethatanalystsandpolicymakersshouldpaymoreattentiontotheimpactsofresourceabundance, militarisedstatepowerandglobalpoliticaleconomicforcesintheirassessmentsofthepotentialconflict impactsofenvironmentalandespeciallyclimatechange.

ß2014ElsevierLtd.Allrightsreserved.

* Correspondingauthor.Tel.:+441273876694.

E-mailaddresses:j.selby@sussex.ac.uk(J.Selby),clemens@bilkent.edu.tr

(C.Hoffmann).

ContentslistsavailableatScienceDirect

Global

Environmental

Change

j ou rna l hom e pa ge : w w w. e l s e v i e r. c om/ l o ca t e / gl oe n v cha

0959-3780/$–seefrontmatterß2014ElsevierLtd.Allrightsreserved.

regularlycharacterisedas‘failed’,‘failing’,‘fragile’or‘weak’states (Ellis, 2005), and as desperately under-developed (Keen, 2001), thesefailingsinturnbeingunderstoodasimportantcontextualor contributory factors in their experiences of scarcity-induced conflict. The Sudans thus serve as a perfect case for testing mainstreamenvironmental security (andspecificallywater and climatesecurity)thinking,andforsuggestinganalternativemodel ofenvironment-conflictrelations.

The article is structured as follows. Immediately below we provide a cursory overview of contemporary environmental conflictdiscourse;critiqueontheoreticalgroundsits overwhelm-ingemphasesonscarcity,statefailureand under-development; andoutlineanalternativemodelofenvironment-conflictrelations. Wethenbrieflysummariseourcasestudymethodology. Thereaf-ter we turn to the Sudans, considering three different sets of claimed (orpossible) links between environmental changeand conflict:(1)overthetrans-boundaryresourcesoftheNile;(2)over internalwaterscarcities;and(3)overinternalwaterabundance andprojectsofagriculturalandwaterdevelopment.Wefindthat thereexistsonlylimitedhistoricalevidenceinsupportofthefirst twooftheselinkages,butplentifulevidencethatwaterabundance, and state-directed processes of economic development and internal colonisation relating to water, have had violent con-sequences.Theconclusionexpandsonthiscorefindingandalso considers the potential purchase of this model under future circumstancesofglobalclimatechange.

2. Theenvironmentandconflictrevisited

Theideaof‘scarcity’providesthecentralorganising concept withincontemporaryenvironmentalconflictdiscourse,including on the conflict potential of water stresses and global climate change.Understoodsometimesin Malthusianterms (as arising when population growth and consumption approach natural limits)andsometimesthroughthelensofneo-classicaleconomics (as an inherent property of all economic goods), scarcity is assumedtogeneratefrustration,competition,grievances,andin turn, potentially, conflict. Thus the UN Secretary General has recently claimed that, within the context of climate change, [c]ompetition between communities and countries for scarce resources,especiallywater,isincreasing,exacerbatingoldsecurity dilemmasandcreatingnewones’(Ban,2011).Manyscholarshave broadlyconcurred.Thecentralthesisoftheleadingexponentof post-ColdWarenvironmentalsecuritydiscourse,Thomas Homer-Dixon, is that ‘environmental scarcity causes violent conflict’ (1999, p. 93). Peter Gleick, leading authority on water and internationalsecurity, presents water’sscarcity as theprimary characteristic that makesit a likely ‘source of strategic rivalry’ (1993,p.84).AndtheIntergovernmentalPanelonClimateChange has concluded that climate change ‘may exacerbate resource scarcitiesindevelopingcountries,’inturnpotentiallygenerating ‘scarcity disputes between countries, clashes between ethnic groups,andcivilstrifeandinsurgency’(2001,p.950);andthat ‘climatechangemaybecomeacontributoryfactortoconflictsin the future, particularly those concerning resource scarcity, for examplescarcityofwater’(2007,p.443).Morerecentquantitative scholarship has tended to find only limited support for the scarcity-conflictthesis (seee.g. Gleditsch, 2012; Johnsonet al., 2011foroverviews);andthemainstreamconcern withscarcity has also been extensively critiqued by political ecologists on theoretical,politicalandevidentialgrounds(e.g.PelusoandWatts, 2001;Benjaminsen,2008).Nonetheless,thebeliefthatscarcitycan causeorcontributetoconflict,andwilldosoincreasinglyinfuture, remainsthecoreframingideaandreferencepoint–evenwhen thisisonlyapointofdeparture–withinenvironmentalconflict debates.

Alongside but secondary to this, most academic and policy discourse on environmental conflict also places significant emphasis on institutional and economic factors as important intervening or contextual causes of scarcity-related conflict. Specifically, economic ‘under’or‘low’ development,and ‘failed’ or ‘weak’ statehood, are routinely depicted as pivotal in determiningwhetherresourcescarcitiesgenerateconflictornot. Insomeacademicaccounts, ‘constrainedeconomicproductivity’ and‘disruptedinstitutions’areconsideredeffectsof environmen-tal scarcity, and thus important pathways to conflict ( Homer-Dixon,1999,pp.81–103).Inothers,bycontrast,theseinstitutional andeconomicfactorsareviewedasindependentvariableswhich typicallyprecedebuttheninteractwithscarcitycrises(Baechler, 1999,pp.41,103;Kahl,2006,pp.24–26).Formost,loweconomic development is such a crucial variable that the analysis of environmental securitychallengescanberestricted,a priori,to poor countries: asNordas and Gleditschobserve, this assumed connectionbetweenenvironmentalconflictandpoverty‘isnota pointofgreatcontroversyintheliterature’(2007,p.635).Likewise, statefailure,weaknessandcontractionaretypicallyviewedaskey. This is especially the case within policy discourse (e.g. CNA Corporation,2007,p.44;UKCabinetOffice,2008,p.18),butalso holds trueof muchof thebest academic analysis: Barnett and Adgerobserve,forinstance,that‘whenstatescontract...violent conflict[overscarceresources]ismorelikely’(2007,p.647).The basicassumptionoperativehereisthattheenvironmentalconflict problematiqueistoa significantdegreecausedormediated by political and economic weaknesses that are internal to non-Westernstates.

Forthepurposesofthisarticle,therearefiveproblemswiththe above thatneed highlighting.First, thewidespread assumption thatenvironmentalconflictsshouldbeanalysedthroughthelens of‘scarcity’,whenotherresourceconflictsaregenerallyseenas arisingfrom‘abundance’(Koubietal.,2013),isparadoxicaland indeed flawed. Within the extant literature on the political economyofcivilwars,resource‘abundance’isgenerallyseenas thekeyvariable,thehighprevalenceofdiamonds,oil,andother non-renewableresourcesbeingcloselylinkedtoconflicts,in Sub-SaharanAfricainparticular(e.g.CollierandHoeffler,2005;Fearon, 2005).Thisispuzzling:themechanismlinkingraremineralsand non-renewableswithconflictisheldtobethe‘resourcecurse’of ‘abundance’,whiletheconditionlinkingwater–themostabundant renewableresourceontheplanet–withconflictisthoughttobe ‘scarcity’.Thislatterlinkageistypicallyjustifiedonthegrounds that disruptions in the availability of environmental resources such as water can contribute to economic decline, social discontent,competitionandinturnconflict–acausalchainwhich is theoretically plausible, ifoften contested. Evenif it is valid, however, water could also be associated withconflict through abundance.Theresourcecurseliteraturetypicallyarguesthatlocal abundancecanleadtoconflictbycreatingincentivesforpartiesto engageinconflict,byprovidingthestateandespeciallyrebelswith thefinancialmeanstosustainconflict,and/orbyweakeningstate institutionsandtransformingstate-society relations(e.g.Collier and Hoeffler, 2005; Fearon, 2005). There is little reason, in principle, why these or some other abundance-related causal dynamicscouldnotalsoapplytowater.

Second, the assumption that some resource conflicts are associatedwith‘scarcity’,whilstothersarecausedby‘abundance’, istheoreticallyincoherent–forthesimplereasonthatscarcityand abundancearerelationalconcepts,which,liketheterms‘master’ andslave’,onlymakesenseinrelationtooneanother.Approached thus,‘scarcity’doesnotrefertoanobjectivelysmallquantumof resources,butinsteadtoacircumstanceinwhichsomeindividuals orgroupshavelessthanothers(i.e.socially),orthantheyhave inotherplaces(i.e.spatially),orthantheyhadatothertimes(i.e.

temporally). Very much the same applies to ‘abundance’. The resourcecurseofdiamondshasoftenbeenassociatedwithcivil warinthelikesofAngolaandSierraLeone–butlocal‘abundance’in suchcountriesonlyexistsrelativetoglobal‘scarcity’,andtothis extentallpreciousgemandmineral-relatedconflictsmustbeas muchabout the latter as the former. Indeed, the illusion that ‘scarcity’and‘abundance’arediscretevariablesisonlysustained byastate-centricpoliticalimaginaryandthequantitativedatasets thataccompanyit.Thusthechallengeisnotsomuchtounderstand whether it is resource scarcity, or abundance, which is most associatedwithconflict;butinsteadtotreatthesetwoconceptsas essentiallypaired–‘scarcity-abundance’–andasreferring to rela-tivedifferencesacrosssociety,spaceandtime,andtoinvestigate whetherandhowtheserelativedifferencesare,ormightbecome, associatedwithconflict.

Third,therearegroundsforthinkingthatitisnottherelative scarcityorabundanceofparticularenvironmentalresources,but rathertheir relative economic and political value, which is the majordeterminant oftheir conflict potential.Asalready noted, withintheexistingliteraturenon-renewableresourcesareoften linkedto conflict through the mechanism of abundance, while renewable environmental resources such as water are usually analysedthroughthelensofscarcity(Koubietal.,2013).Butthe high conflict potential of for instance diamonds does not essentiallylieintheirabundance,somuchasintheirhighvalue. Equally,theintimatelinks betweenoil andmilitaryconflictare aboveallrootedintheformer’seconomicandpoliticalvalue,oil beingboththemainstayofglobalmassconsumersociety,anda vitalsourceof,orpotentialrouteto,wealthandpowerforproducer state elites and the various worldwide economic and political interestslinkedtothem(especiallyintheoil,financialandmilitary production sectors).In most contexts,environmental resources are,bycontrast,ofrelatively loweconomic andpolitical value: water,forinstance,isgenerallynotaroutetowealthandpower (Selby,2005a).Itisarguablyessentiallyforthisreasonthatthere havebeennomoderninter-state‘waterwars’(Wolf,1998):within the context of contemporary global capitalism, environmental resourceslikewaterarejustnotofsufficientvaluetobeapriority foreconomicandpoliticalelites(Selby,2005a).

Fourth, academicand policy discourseon scarcity (or abun-dance,intheresourcecurseliterature)isalmostalwayspremised onamechanisticandgeographicallydeterministicunderstanding ofresourceconflict.Thepointhereisnotsimply,paceGleditsch et al., that most conflicts are not ‘over sometype of resource perceived as scarce’ (2006, p. 362), or even that conflicts are typically caused by various historically and socially specific political,ideological,economicandidentityfactorsthat gowell beyondresourceavailabilityanddistribution.Justassignificantly, these non-resource factors structure how resources are approached and valued. The extant literature almost always analyseswhetherandhowenvironmentalchanges(e.g.suddenor secularchanges in precipitation) orincreases indemand (from populationgrowthor increasedpercapitaconsumption) deter-mineorcontributetoconflict.Butthisoverlooksthepossibility thatresource-relatedconflictscanoccurwithoutanychangein,or irrespectiveof,supply–demandbalances,forinstancethroughthe riseofnewideologies,policiesorpoliticalandeconomicstructures which result in theresources in questionbeing deemed more valuableandconflict-worthythanhitherto.Forexample,repeated USandUKmilitaryinterventionsinMiddleEasternoilstateshave notbeenrootedinsuddenorsecularchangesintheavailabilityof oil,butinspecificpoliticalandeconomicinterestsandstrategies. Equally, ‘blood diamond’conflicts have not beenstructured by changes in the prevalence of diamonds, but rather by the consistentlyhighvalueascribedtothembyWesternconsumers undertheinfluenceofDe Beersand theworldwideadvertising

industry.Ifandwhenscarcity-abundanceisanimportantcausal factor within conflicts, this is not because it mechanically determines behaviour,but tothe extentthat it is deemedand interpretedasimportantbypartiestoconflict,withinthecontext ofglobalpoliticaleconomicstructures.

Equivalentproblemsbedevilthewidespreademphasesonstate failureandunder-development.Theideaof‘statefailure’hasbeen widelycritiquedasanessentiallynormativeratherthananalytical concept,thatismoreaproductofvariouspost-ColdWarWestern securityintereststhanatoolofrigorouspoliticalanalysis(e.g.Call, 2008;LoganandPreble,2010).Asananalyticaltool,however,its central emphasisand value is in pointingtothe problems that emanatefromweakanddisintegratingstateinstitutions,thatis, fromalackofsovereignstatecontroloverpopulationsandterritory. Thereareatleasttwoproblemshere.Firstly,manyofthegravest insecuritiesintheglobalSoutharisenotjustfromstateweakness, butratherfrommilitarisedstatestrategiesandprocessesof state-buildingandinternalcolonisationwhichinthecontemporaryglobal South,as previously inEurope, havenecessarilyinvolved wide-spreadviolenceanddispossession(StavrianakisandSelby,2012). Secondly, many of these insecurities and state strategies have importantinternational andgeopoliticaldimensions,ratherthan beingmereinternalcharacteristicsofthe‘failedstates’inquestion. Toillustratefromanearlierhistoricalera,thedevastating climate-related famines experienced across India, China, Brazil and elsewhereduringthelatenineteenthcenturywere,intheirpolitical dimensions, essentially products of British imperial power and doctrine, not weak local governance (Davis, 2002). The role of aggressivestateinstitutionsandstrategiesincreatingor exacerbat-ing resource insecurities is sometimes recognised within the environmental security literature: Kahl (2006), for instance, analyses both ‘state failure’ and ‘state exploitation’ resource conflicts. But most academic and virtually all policy discourse remainsinattentivetothese exploitative stateandinternational dimensionsofresource-relatedconflicts.

Sixth andfinally, theemphasison ‘under-development’ asa causeofscarcityconflictsisproblematicforsimilarreasons.The under-developmentthesisdrawsheavilyonrecenteconometric research on civil wars which has repeatedly concluded that povertyandlowdevelopmentarecloselycorrelatedwithcivilwar (e.g.Murshed,2002).Therearethreeproblemshere,eachofwhich alsoappliestotheenvironmentalsecurityliterature.Firstly,such claims aboutthecorrelation between povertyand violence are historically myopic: yes, civil wars since the 1980s have been overwhelminglyconcentratedintheglobalSouth,mostnotably Sub-Saharan Africa, but this has not been the case in earlier historicaleras,andthusneednotbeinthefuture(seee.g.Halperin, 2004).Thereisthusnonecessaryapriorireasonwhyenvironment and resource-relatedconflicts shouldbelimited to, oremanate from,poorstates.Secondly,againsttheassumptionthatpoverty andlowdevelopmentcauseconflict,ithashistoricallybeenthe case that processes of economic and social development have themselves been inherently conflictual, and inherently violent. Indeed,bothhistorically(Moore,1967)andinthecontemporary South(Cramer,2006),warhashadformativeproductiveimpacts on,andbeenanabidingcharacteristicof,‘development’.Moreover, thirdly,under-developmentisnevermerelyaninternal character-istic of poor states and societies, but a product also of their structural positioning and insertion into a highly uneven and hierarchicalworld economy. Whatthis suggestsis at least the theoreticalpossibilitythatenvironment-relatedconflictsmaybe caused,notbylocalandinternaldevelopmentdeficits,butinstead byprocessesofdevelopmentthatareinternationallystructured,or evensanctioned.

These six lines of critique suggest an alternative model for understanding the relations between the environment and

conflict,asfollows.Afirstguidingpremiseofthismodelisthatitis relations and processes (the social, geographical and temporal relationsbetween‘scarcity’and‘abundance’;andprocessesof state-buildinganddevelopment)ratherthanobjectiveconditions,levels orvariables(e.g.levelsofscarcityorofdevelopment)whicharethe key to understanding the links between the environment and conflict.Linkedtothisisasecondpremise:thattheserelationsand processes are not defined or limited by state boundaries, and cannot be understood through the analytical lens of state-centrism,butinsteadoperateatmultiplelocal,national, interna-tionalandglobalscales,andarealsomulti-scalarintheircauses. Building on this, our hypothesestrack the six lines of critique above:first,thatrelativelocalenvironmentalabundanceismore intimately associated with conflict than local environmental scarcity; second, that such local abundance only assumes importancerelativeto‘scarcities’elsewhere;third,thatit isthe relativepoliticaland economicvalueofdifferentenvironmental resources,rather thantheirabundanceorscarcity,whichis the major determinant of their conflict potential; fourth, that it is politicalprocessesandeconomicdynamics,ratherthanchangesin resourceavailability,whicharethemainproximatedeterminants of environment-related conflict; and finally, that the most important such dynamics are local processes of state-building and development, which are in turn embedded in broader geopoliticalandglobalpolitical-economicrelations.

3. Methodology

To test thesehypotheses, we undertake below a qualitative historicalanalysisofwater-conflictrelationsinasingle(large)case study area, Sudan. We focus on water specifically since, of all environmentalresources,itiswaterwhichismostoftenassociated withscarcity-inducedconflict.Similarly,wefocusonSudansinceit isoftenviewedasatextbookcaseofenvironmentalsecurity,as indicatedabove.Theoretically,ouranalysisisprincipallyinformed by historical materialist scholarship in International Relations (Halliday,1994;RupertandSmith,2002)andGeography(Harvey, 1996,2009),thoughitalsoowesmuchtoworkinpoliticalecology (PelusoandWatts,2001).Inlinewiththeseapproaches,weview developmentandstateformationasinherentlyconflict–ladenand violentprocesses–inSudanaselsewhere,includinghistoricallyin Europe (Ayers, 2010; Tilly, 1985). Also in line with these approaches,aswellasourcriticalcommentsabove,ourmethod isintentionallyqualitative:theanalysisofmulti-scalarprocesses andrelationsdemandsjustsuchamethod,andcannotcoherently bepursuedthroughaquantitativeanalysisofcorrelationsbetween supposedlydistinct‘variables’.Wetestthreesetsofclaimed(or possible)linksbetweenwaterandconflictinSudan:(1)over trans-boundarywatersoftheNile;(2)overthelinksbetweeninternal Sudaneseresourcescarcitiesand civilconflict;and (3)over the internalconflict impacts ofwater abundanceand development. The analysis draws upon fieldwork conducted in South Sudan during 2011 and 2012, plus existing literatures on Sudanese history,politicaleconomyandtheenvironment.Ofthisexisting literature,weshouldmentioninparticularthesignificantparallels betweenouranalysisand thatof Verhoeven(2011b).However, whereas Verhoeven’s main concern is to critique mainstream environment-conflict narratives as they have been invoked in relationtoSudan,weaimheretogoa stepfurtherandofferan originalpositiveaccountofenvironment-conflictrelationsthatis relevantnotonlytoSudan,butalsobeyond.

4. ScarcityandcompetitionontheNile

TheclaimthatthelimitedwaterresourcesoftheRiverNileare subject to increasing pressures and competition, leading to

growing strategic rivalryand potentially tointer-state conflict, isastapleofthewatersecurityliterature.Indeed,withinmuchof thisliterature,theprospectsforconflictovertheNilearediscussed more than any other case (e.g. Gleick, 1993; ICA, 2012). This concernaboutNilegeopoliticsisfoundedonthreemainfactors: thehighlevelsofpopulationandeconomicgrowthwithintheNile basin states, which are deemed likely to increase pressure on supplies;theextreme dependenceofthedownstreamriparians, especiallyEgypt,ontransboundaryNileflows;andtheabsenceof any basin-widewatermanagement regime amongstthe eleven (includingSouthSudan)Nileriparians.Egypt,inparticular,faces an undoubtedly challenging situation,being97% dependent on transboundaryflows(FAO,2009),andfacingtheprospectof500 cubic metres/capita/year (m3_{/year) water availability by 2025,} according to its Ministry of Water Resources and Irrigation (Moussa,2012;MWRI,2010)–which,bythemostwidelyused measureofwaterstress,wouldplaceitinthecategoryof‘absolute scarcity’(Falkenmark,1989).SecuringtheNileisoftensaidtobe Egypt’s primary consideration in its relations with Sudan and upstreamripariansand,indeed,Nilestateleadershaverepeatedly raised the prospect of war over access to it. President Sadat observed,forinstance,that‘wedependupontheNile100%inour life,soifanyone,atanymoment,seekstodepriveusofourlife,we shallneverhesitatetogotowar’(Waterbury,1979,p.78).Egyptian ForeignMinisterBoutrosGhalideclaredin1990that‘thenextwar intheMiddleEastwillbeoverwater,notpolitics’–anunfortunate statementnotonlyinitsassumptionthatwaterisextra-political, butalsoinitstiming,justbeforeIraq’sinvasionofKuwait(Selby, 2005b,p.339).In2010,EthiopianPrimeMinisterMelesZenawi accusedEgyptofsupportingrebelforcesinhiscountry,inorderto preventitfromdevelopingtheNile(Malone,2010).Andjustprior to his overthrow, Egyptian President Morsi implied that Cairo mightrespondmilitarilytoEthiopiandamconstruction, threaten-ingthatiftheNile‘diminishesbyonedrop,thenourbloodisthe alternative’(Verhoeven,2013).

Yetforallthisrhetoric,post-colonialSudanhasnotbeenasiteof, orpartyto,anysignificanttrans-boundaryconflictovertheNile, despiteaccountingforover60%oftheriver’stotalbasinarea. Hydro-politicalrelationsbetweenSudanandEgypthavehistoricallybeen characterisedmuchmorebycooperationthanconflict.Tothisday, these relations remain governedby the terms ofthe 1959Nile Waters Agreement, which codified Sudanese and Egyptian Nile allocations,sanctionedtheconstructionoftheAswanHighDamin EgyptplustheRoseriesDaminSudan,andestablishedaPermanent JointTechnicalCommissiontooversee thecoordinated manage-mentanddevelopmentoftheriver(UAR/Sudan,1959).Moreover, Sudan’sactualutilisationremainswellbelowitsannualallocationof 18.5billionm3_{(annualabstractionfromtheNilevariesbetween10} and 16bm3_{/year: Hamad,1998;Omer, 2007,p. 2070).Sudan is} currentlyengagedinanambitiousdam-buildingprogramme,which may bring its average utilisation close to this 1959 allocation (Verhoeven, 2011a, p. 19).However, all Sudanese dam-building activityhasbeenexplicitlyorimplicitlyapprovedbyEgypt(Swain, 2011,p. 699;Taha, 2010, p.196). Indeed,ratherthan tryingto preventincreasedSudaneseutilisation,Egyptisactively participat-ingintheexpansionofSudaneseagriculture,throughits‘African farms’ strategy (Ali, 2011; MALR, 2012). Of course, this hydro-politicalcooperationisbetweenEgyptandSudanalone,excluding upstreamriparians;andeventhis bilateral‘cooperation’maybe considered an instance of Egyptian ‘hydro-hegemony’, a means throughwhichEgyptmaintainsinstitutionalisedhegemonyoverthe Nile(ZeitounandWarner,2006).Nonetheless,itremainsthecase thatEgyptian-Sudanesewaterrelationshavenotbeenmarkedby anysignificant,letaloneviolent,conflict.

Equally, Nilewatershave notbeena key issue,orsourceof dispute,withintheSudanesepeaceprocess. The260page-long

2005ComprehensivePeace Agreementbarelymentioned water issues,andaccountsofthethreeyearsofnegotiations underpin-ningtheAgreement suggest that the Nilebarelyfigured at all (Johnson,2011;Young,2012).UndertheComprehensivePeace Agreement,Nilewatermanagementremainedunderthe exclu-sivejurisdictionofthenationalgovernment(GoS andSPLM/A, 2005:ChapterII,Part5,ScheduleA:33).Similarly,waterissues didnotreceiveanygreattimeorattentionduringthe2005–2011 interim phase of the peace process, and have not featured prominentlyinpost-referendumnegotiations(ICG,2011;UNSC, 2011).Indeed,nexttotheotheroutstandingpost-secessionissues – final border demarcation,oil revenue sharing, the status of Abyei,citizenship,andpopulationreturn,aswellasthemilitary conflictinBlueNileandSouthKordofanstates–waterappearsto havebeenveryfarfromapriority.Aconjunctionofthreefactors probably lies behind this. Firstly, the Comprehensive Peace Agreement’sdefinitionofNilewatermanagementasKhartoum’s competence,plusthelimitedattentionpaidtowaterissuessince then,reflectstheNorth’sstatusquointerestsinmaintainingand perhapsextendingitscontrolovertheNile(Granitetal.,2011,p. 25). Second, there is little immediate demand for increased utilisation of the Nile in South Sudan: almostall agricultural production there is rain-fed; there were no functional pump irrigationprojectsintheSouthwhentheComprehensivePeace Agreementwasconcludedin2005(Salman,2011,p.161);major abstractionofNilewatersremainsyearsaway;andotherissues, especiallyregardingoilrevenuesandsecurity,wereforobvious reasonsdeemedmoreimmediateprioritiesinlayingthe founda-tions for a new state. Thirdly, the Sudan People’s Liberation Movementmayhavedeemeditsensibletodelaydiscussionofthe Nilegiventheissue’spotentialtocomplicaterelationswithother Nileripariansand evenjeopardisethepeace process(Salman, 2011,pp.161–162).Asithappens,theseexternalactors’ hydro-securityconcernshavenotbeenmajorsourcesofdisputewithin thepeaceprocess.Egyptwasoftensaidtobehostiletotheideaof southernsecession,inlargepartforhydro-politicalreasons(e.g.

ICG,2010,pp.10–11;Johnson,2003,p.43).However,intheevent Egypt supported the South’s secession after South Sudanese President Salva Kiir, keen to warm Cairo to the idea of independence,providedassurancesthatEgyptianwatersupplies would not be affected (Wikileaks, 2010). Egypt has since developedgood politicalandwaterrelationswithindependent SouthSudan,buildingonitslong-establishedcolonialand post-colonialexpertiseontheregion’shydrology(Interview,2011a, 2011b).Withoutidealisingthesewaterrelations–whichinvolve hydro-hegemonic‘controlthroughcooperation’–itis nonethe-lessevidentthatSudan’spartition hasnot ledto,or involved, waterscarcity-relatedconflicts.

BeyondtheseSudan-specificissues,cautionisalsodueonthe overallvalidityofNilescarcitydiscourse.Forallthetalkoflooming water scarcity, there hasbeen no average decline in Nile flow throughSudansince the1960s,nodeclineinthewaterlevelof LakeNasser,andnodeclineinthevolumeofwaterreleasedinto EgyptthroughtheHighAswanDam.Indeed,duringthetenyears 2000–2010,anaverage60.8bm3_{/yearwerereleasedthroughthe} HighAswanDam(Abdel-LatifandYacoub,2011,pp.89–90)–well inexcessofthe55.5bm3/yearallocatedtoEgyptundertheNile Waters Agreement. Egypt continues to expand its irrigated agriculture,notablyintheToshka,EastOwainat,Darbal-Araba’in and As-Salam Canal projects (Barnes, 2012, p. 518). Future populationandagriculturalexpansioninEgypt,andanyequivalent development in Ethiopia and otherupstream riparians, will of course place greater pressure on Nile waters. But there is no evidence as yet of scarcity imposing limits on utilisation and development,letaloneevidenceofsuchscarcitiesgenerating,or contributingto,trans-boundaryconflicts.

5. ScarcityandcivilconflictinSudan

Parallel to this questionable discourse of trans-boundary conflict on theNilearethefrequent claimsthat internalwater scarcitieswithinSudanarealreadygeneratingorcontributingto civil violence. International and Sudanese actors alike have regularlyidentifiedsuchlinkages,especiallyinrelationtoDarfur. IntheUKalone,theMinistryofDefence(DCDC,2010,p.106),a SecretaryofStateforEnergyandClimateChange(Huhne,2011), and leadingthink tanks(Mazo,2010)and NGOs (ChristianAid, 2007),amongstothers,haveallinterpretedconflict inDarfuras caused or compounded by water stresses. In North America, ThomasHomer-Dixonhasdonelikewise(Homer-Dixon,2007),as haveJeffreySachs,ProfessorofEconomicsatColumbiaUniversity (Sachs,2006,2005), formerUS Vice PresidentGore(2006),and leadingacademicanalystsofSudanesepolitics(deWaal,2007a; Mamdani,2009).BanhasnotonlydescribedtheDarfurconflictas beginning ‘as an ecological crisis, arising in part from climate change’(Ban,2007),buthasalsoassertedthat‘ifyoudon’tdeal withtheissueofwaterinDarfur...thentherewillbenosolution at all’ (Hokanson, 2007) – a verdict corroborated by Ibrahim Gambari, headoftheAfricanUnion/UN missioninDarfur,who contendsthat‘waterscarcity...imperil[s]ourcommoneffortsto achieve peaceand stabilityinDarfur’ (UNAMID,2011). Sudan’s President Bashir (Tisdall, 2011) and Foreign Minister Ali Karti (SUNA,2009)havebothexplainedtheDarfurwarasaproductof climate-change inducedwater scarcities,Bashir’s accountbeing typical:‘WhathappenedinDarfur,firstofall,wasatraditional conflicttakingplacefromthecolonialdays.Underall(previous) national governments, there were tribal conflicts in Darfur, becauseofthefrictionsbetweentheshepherdsandthefarmers. Thesekindsoffrictionsincreasedbecauseofclimatechangeand thedryweatherwhichalsoincreasedthemovementofpeopleand herds,whichledtomorefriction.’Such linkageshavealsobeen drawninrelationtoSouthSudan.Forexample,onecommentator claimsthat ‘mostoftheconflictswhichhave plaguedSouthern Sudan’sincethe2005ComprehensivePeaceAgreement‘arewater accessrelated’(Luoi,2010),whileSouthSudan’sMinisterofLabour has claimed, speaking at a reconciliation conference between groupsfromLakesandWarrapstates,that‘accessibilitytowateris themainproblem’[sic](Mayoum,2010).Mostsuchdiscourseon Sudanispredicatedonasimilarsetofclaimsorassumptions:that internal Sudanese water scarcities and attendant processes of desertificationareasourceofandtosomedegreecorrelatedwith conflicts;thatthesescarcewaterresourcesareprincipallyfought overbycompetingpastoralistsandfarmers;thatsuchconflictsare alsoproductsof,orarecompoundedby,subsistencelivelihoods, lowdevelopmentandweakstatecontrol;andoften,thatthewater scarcitiesarepartlycausedbyanthropogenicclimatechange.

Therearethreesetsofproblemswithsuchclaims.Firstly,they receive only thethinnest supportfrom,and in some cases are contradictedby,theactualrecordofrecentenvironmentalchange inSudan.ConsiderfirstDarfur,whichhasbeentheprimaryfocusof suchclaims.TheDarfurwarbrokeoutin2003,withtheviolence beingatitsheightbetweenthenand2005.Yetduringthisthree yearperiod,Darfurexperiencedaboveaveragerainfall(Kevaneand Gray,2008;UNEP,2008,pp.8,11).Moreover,rainfalllevelswere not gradually‘declining’prior to2003; tothecontrary, rainfall levelsduringthe1990sandearly2000sweregenerallyabovethe thirtyyearaverage,withnomajordroughtsafter1990(Kevane and Gray, 2008, p. 4).Thisrainfall evidenceis corroborated by evidenceofagreeningofDarfur(andtheSahelbeyond)sincethe early 1990s which is visible through satellite imagery (Brown, 2010;Herrmannetal.,2005;Olssonetal.,2005).Darfurwasnot witnessto‘desertification’priortothewar(UNEP,2007)–this notioninanycasebeingaproblematicsimplification(Swift,1996;

ThomasandMiddleton,1994)–andthewardidnoterupt‘during thedrought’(Ban,2007).Therefore,ifprecipitationchangesand resultingvegetativetransformationsdidhave animpacton the Darfurwar,thecrucialfactormusteitherhavebeentherelative abundancepost-1990(apossibilityforwhichforwhichweknow ofnoevidence)orrelativescarcitiesintheprecedingdecades,with adecade-plustime-lagtothewaritself.Indeed,theobviouscaseof simultaneitybetweenwaterscarcityandconflictonsetinSudanis notprovidedbytheDarfurwar,butthe1983–2005civilwar–but thereisnosuggestionintheexistingliteraturethatdroughtwasa factorinthiswar’soutbreak.

Just as water scarcity and conflict in Sudan have not been temporally correlated, so equally there is no clear spatial correlationbetween thetwo.During theDarfur war,the worst violencetookplaceinareasofrelativelygoodrainfall,alongthe southernand westernfringesof theJebelMarrahighlands,and betweenthereandtheborderwithChad–areaswith‘amongstthe richestagriculturallandsinSudan’(Mamdani,2009,p.10;see:US Department of State, 2004 for location of destroyed villages). Indeed,consideringSudanasawhole,themostperennialviolence inthefiftyplusyearssinceindependencehasbeeninthestatesof southernSudan–areaswiththehighestrainfalllevels.Itisalso worth noting that, while there are of course huge internal differences in precipitation and water availability, Sudan as a wholeisnotwater-scarce:totalprecipitationvolumepercapitain SudanisoverfivetimesthatintheUK,whiletotalrenewablewater resourcespercapita areestimated atover 60% of theUKlevel (calculatedfromFAO,2012a,2012b). Riskanalystshave ranked Sudanas93rdor‘lowrisk’forwaterscarcity(Maplecroft,2011). Asecond problem withclaimsthat internalwater scarcities have caused conflict in the Sudans is that they rest upon stereotypical and outdated assumptions about Sudanese liveli-hoodsandsociety.ConsiderDarfur,onceagain.Inwaterscarcity readingsoftheDarfurwar,itisthoughtthatdroughtcaused(or significantly contributed to) conflict by challenging traditional subsistence livelihoods, leading to migration from areas of environmentalstress,andtoheightenedconflictamongstnomadic pastoralists,andbetweenthemandsedentaryfarmers(Ban,2007; Faris,2007). At leasttwo assumptions are operative here:that Darfur’s‘traditional’economyandsocietyareutterlydominated anddeterminedbytheavailabilityofwater;andequally,thatthis traditionalism–Darfur’slowlevelofdevelopment–wasacrucial interveningvariablebetween(claimed)waterscarcities andthe descentintowar.Bothofthesepremisesaremistaken,however. Farfrombeingmerely‘traditional’,contemporarylivelihoods acrosstheSudans arehybrid,dynamic, globallyintegrated and arguablythereforealsodistinctly‘modern’.Thesubsistencetribal peasantnolongerexistsinDarfur,andhasnotdonefordecades(de Waal, 1989, p. 55). Moreover, contrary to the oft-invoked distinctionbetween‘nomads’and‘settledfarmers’,todaynearly allfarmersraiselivestock,whilstnearlyallpastoralistscultivate crops(Youngand Osman,2005,p.10). Bothlivestockand crop productionareheavilycommercialisedandexport-oriented.While cropsusedtobeSudan’smajorexportcommodity,thelivestock sectorhasrecentlyexperienceddramaticgrowthfigures,making Sudan theleading livestock exporterin the region (Young and Osman,2005,p.52).This,inturn,wasadirectresultofthe state-ledliberalisationofthesectorthatbeganwiththereplacementof the parastatal Livestock and Meat Marketing Corporation with commerciallivestockbanksin1992(UNEP,2012,p.19).Farming practicescontinuouslychangeandadapt,inresponsetoassorted economic and environmental variables. Moreover, rural liveli-hoodsinDarfurandacrosstheSudansarenotsolelydependenton localproductionandthereforewater,butequallyonremittances (especiallyfromLibya,SaudiArabiaandotheroilproducerstates:

Young and Osman, 2005, pp. 83–108; Young et al., 2007)

internationalaid(Sudanranksamongstthelargestrecipientsof overseasaid,mostofitintheformofhumanitarianaid,especially to Darfur, see: Poole, 2011), and public sector employment, especiallyinthesecuritysector(onestatesalaryinSouthSudan beingreportedtomaintain30people:EnvironmentWaterSecurity Workshop2012).

Ofcourse,theSudansranknearthefootofmostinternational developmentindicators,andDarfurisarelativelyperipheralarea withinnorthernSudan:tothisextent,conflictinDarfurisbroadly correlatedwithunder-development.Butnotonlywiththis,since theDarfurwaralsocoincidedwiththeearlyyearsofSudan’soil boom.Oilexportsfrom1999onwardsspurredaverageannualGDP growthof6.75%from2000to2003,comparedwithonly2.7%inthe preceding20years(IMF,2009).Onthebackofthisoil-ledgrowth, during the early 2000s there were significant increases in government revenues and expenditure, in the size of the agriculturalsector,andin bothinternationalarmsprocurement and domestic military production (Patey, 2010; ICG, 2002). Whether there was any causal relationship between these developmentsandthewarinDarfur,wecannotsay.Butthisat leastsuggeststhattheDarfurwarwasasmuchcorrelatedwith processesofdevelopment,asitsdearth.

Landdisputes,migration and challengestopastoralist liveli-hoodshaveallbeenwidelyrecognisedassignificantcontributors topoliticalviolenceinDarfurandbeyond(e.g.Assal,2009;Unruh, 2012).However, noneofthesehavebeensolelyorevenmainly rootedineitherwaterscarcityorlowdevelopment,butratherina combinationofcolonialandpost-colonialdevelopmentpractices. TheBritishcolonialeraleftalegacyofhighlyunevenlandrelations, inwhichcontestationoverpropertyrelationsbetweentribeswas aggravated,withsomeremainingdependentonaccesstoothers’ landandwater:thisapplies,forinstance,totheNorthernReizegat, whoplayedsuchapivotalroleintheDarfurwar,constitutingthe bulk of the Janjawid militia (Mamdani, 2009). More recently, appropriativeandconflict-riddenprocessesofdevelopmenthave involved, inter alia, the conversion of open rangelands into agriculturalland,includingirrigated landalong seasonalrivers; theenclosureofbothfarmlandandpastures,andthedenialofopen accesstoandfreemovementthroughtheselands;andincreased stocksizes–allofwhichhaveexacerbatedbothpressuresonthe environment and the aforementioned colonial legacies (Ayers, 2010;BarnettandAbdelkarim,1987).Khartoum-led administra-tive reforms have also led to a decline of traditional conflict mechanisms,especiallyregardinglandtenure(Suliman,2010,p. 142).Nexttothesedevelopments,droughthasbeenasecondary and passing–thoughduringparticularperiodscrucial– factor. Poor rains during the 1970s and 1980s challenged existing livelihood strategies right across the Sahel, leading entire communities tomigrate southwards,and contributing, perhaps decisively,tosocio-economic changesin Darfur.However, even allowing for this, drought has not just been a determinant, compelling communities to migrate and change livelihoods: droughthasalsocreated opportunities.During the1980s,some groups in Darfur migrated southwards not so much to escape droughtandscarcity,buttoaccessabundantpastureseffectively ‘openedup’bythesouthwardsretreatofthetsetsefly(deWaal, 2007b).Equally,somegroups,mostnotablytherelativelywealthy Zaghawa,havemigratedprimarilyduringyearsofmoreplentiful rainfall (deWaal, 2007b). Neitherland disputes, migration nor what Mamdani calls ‘the crisis of nomadism across the entire Sahelian belt’(Mamdani,2009,p.211)arerootedessentiallyin waterscarcity,ortraditionandunder-development,butratherin theviolentcontradictionsofmodernisationanddevelopment.

Inadditiontothis,thirdly,waterscarcity-conflictdiscourseon Sudanispremisedonmisunderstandingsoftheroleofthestate andelitesinSudanesepolitics,includingthestate’sandRiverine

elites’centralroleasagentsofpoliticalviolence.Thispoliticalissue isoftensimplyelidedwithinscarcity-conflictdiscourseonSudan, asifconflictwereanautomaticandreflexiveproductofscarcity, irrespectiveof political agency. Thustheaforementioned UNEP reportconcludesthat ‘thereis a verystrong linkbetween land degradation,desertificationandconflictinDarfur’despite admit-tingelsewherethatithadchosen‘nottoinvestigateindetailthe socialandpoliticalaspectsofconflictsinSudan,focusinginstead ontheirenvironmentaldimensions’(UNEP,2007,pp.8,73).Where politicsisdiscussedwithinthisdiscourse,itisprimarilyintermsof theabsenceofpoliticalagencyand authority–that is,weakor failingstatehood–notitsdecisivepresence.Forinstance,inits mostrecentdiscussionofglobalstrategictrends,theUKMinistry ofDefencenotonlycharacterisesconflictinDarfuras‘anexample ofhowclimatechangemayaffectweakstates,’butalsorestrictsits discussionoftheroleoftheSudanesestatetotheobservationthat it‘lackedthenecessaryinfrastructureandresourcestorespondto thecrisis’(DCDC,2010,p.106).

Yetcontrarytosuchclaims,theDarfurwarwasessentiallya brutalcounter-insurgencyoperation,launchedandfinancedbythe governmentin Khartoum, and conducted by a combination of Sudanesearmy,intelligenceandairforceunits,andparamilitary Janjawidbrigades(whofarfrombeingindependentofthestate, often wore army uniforms, often operated in the company of regulararmyunits,andwouldregularlyundertaketheir attacks immediately after Sudanese Air force bombing raids: Prunier, 2005). The initial insurgency was not merely local either: politically, it was the product of Bashir’s ‘Palace Revolt’ and ‘breakdownofeliteaccommodation’withintheNCP’sclientelistic networks(Roessler,2011a,p.45)whichineffectsubstituteda‘civil warriskforcouprisk’(Roessler,2011b,p.302;alsoGallab,2008); whilstmilitarily, Darfur’srebel movements received significant politicalandmilitarysupportfromtheprincipalnational opposi-tion,theSudanPeople’sLiberationArmy/Movement.TheDarfur conflictwasalsosignificantlyinfluencedbyColdWareraregional legacies,notably political crisis in theChad and Gadaffi’s pan-Africanism–makingtheDarfurwarnot onlypoliticalbut geo-political(e.g.Mamdani,2009,pp.213–220).TheDarfur war,in sum,wasanationalandregionalratherthanmerelylocalconflict, themostsignificantrootsofwhichlay1000kmaway fromthe burningvillagesofWestDarfur,onthebanksoftheNile.Anditwas aconflict inwhich theSudanesestatewasthecentralagentof violence.TheDarfurwarwasnotcausedbyscarcity,wasasmuch associatedwithdevelopmentaswithunder-development,andwas asmuchaboutstatepowerasstatefailure.

6. Relativeabundance,developmentandconflict

By contrast with this limited evidence of scarcity-induced violentconflict,thereisclearhistoricalevidenceinSudanoflinks betweenrelativewaterabundanceanddevelopment,andensuing violence.Indeed,someof themost violentepisodes inSudan’s troubled history have involved attempts to capture water resourcesandwater-richlands,foragricultural(andmorebroadly socio-economic)development.

Themostwellknowninstanceofthisrelatestotheattempted constructionoftheJongleiCanalinsouthernSudan.Theambition behindthis projectwas, andforsomeremains,toavoid evapo-transpiration losses from the Nile by circumventing the Sudd swamps,andthroughsodoingincreasingNileflowbyupto7bm3/ year–thisvolumetobesharedequallybetweenSudanandEgypt (Ahmad,2008,p.578).ConstructionoftheCanalstartedin1978, anditsoonbecameclearthatpromisesmadebytheSudaneseand Egyptian authorities for community water supply projects alongsideit were not being kept (Johnson,2003, p. 48), while theCanal’s constructionwasdisruptinglivelihoodsand wildlife

and cattle migration routes, causing significant resentment amongst the southern Sudanese, especially the cattle-herding Dinka, whosaw theprojectas typifyingKhartoum’spolicies of exploitation and neglect (Collins, 1988, p. 152; Lako, 1988). Indicativeof this, theexcavation machineused for diggingthe CanalwastargetedbytheSudanPeople’sLiberationArmyatthe onsetofSudan’ssecondcivilwar.Whilethischoiceoftargetshould notbeinterpretedasevidencethatSudan’ssecondcivilwarwas essentiallyhydro-politicalinitscauses–oilinstallationswerealso targeted–itnonethelessencapsulatestheintimatelinksthatdo existbetweenwaterdevelopmentandconflictinSudan.

Dam constructionprojects and irrigationschemes have also repeatedlyledtodisplacement,dispossessionand,inturn,political andsometimesviolentconflict.TheestablishmentoftheGhezira and Mangalischemesin theearlynineteenthcenturygradually transformedapopulationofhalfamillionintotenantfarmersand wage labourers, this process involving the forced, and often violent,appropriationofcommonland,labourandwater(Barnett, 1977;Beer,1955,p.44).80,000weredisplacedduringthe1960s construction of theRoseries I Dam(Taha, 2010,p. 198), and a further 100,000 by the Aswan High Dam/Wadi Haifa project, leadingtoprotestswhichcontinuetothisday(Taha,2010,p.195). Morerecently,theconstructionoftheMeroweDamhasinvolved the displacementof 50–70,000 (Sudan Tribune, 2008), and the recentlycompletedheighteningoftheRoseriesDaminBlueNile State is said to have displaced 22,000 families (Raziq, 2012). Ensuingprotests have beenviolently suppressed in both cases (Abbas,2012;SudanTribune,2011).

Suchexamplespaleintoinsignificance,however,relativetothe widespreadandnearcontinuousviolencewhichhasragedacross Sudan’ssemi-peripherysincethe1980s,associatedwithaccessto and thedevelopmentof rain-fedagriculturalland. Sudan’sfirst civil war (1955–1972) was confined to the South, and was essentially rooted in political disagreements and objectives relatingtotheconstitutionalstructureofthenewlyindependent state.Bycontrast,Sudan’ssecondcivilwar–orwhatsubsequently becameanetworkofmultipleinternalwars–hasinvolvedfighting in SouthernKordofan,Blue Nile,Kassalaand Red Seastates, all partsofthe‘MuslimNorth’.Thepost-2003warinDarfuralsofits intothiscategory.Thesemultipleconflictshavemainlybeenin ‘intermediate’regions–thatis,inareaswhicharepoliticallyand economicallysemi-peripheral,lyingneither inSudan’sNorthern NilestateheartlandsnorintheSouthernperiphery;andwhichare mostlyalsoecologicallytransitional,lyingbetweentheSaharato thenorthandtheequatorialzonetothesouth.Thefundamental reasonforthisgeographicalshiftisthatresourceappropriationhas beenacentralcauseandobjectiveofthemultiplewarswitnessed inSudansincethe1980s,butwasnotacentralcauseofthefirst civilwar;andthatithasbeeninSudan’ssemi-periphery‘where assettransfer’–especiallytheappropriationofrain-fedland–‘has beenmostmarked’(Johnson,2003,p.145).

Nowherehavethesedynamicsbeenmoreinevidencethanin the Nuba Mountains of South Kordofan. The Nuba Mountains regionandtheirmajorityNubapopulationhavelongbeentargeted bytheSudanesestateandreverineelite,bothonethnic-cultural grounds, and with an eye to the appropriation of rain-fed agriculturalland for cotton production. Thisreached its height in the early 1990s when an estimated 20–30,000 Nuba were deported toresettlement campsknown as‘peace villages’,and forcedtoworkinlarge-scalemechanisedfarmingschemes(Salih, 1995,p.76),theirappropriatedlandthenbeingauctionedtoArab businesses and settlers by the Sudanese Ministry of Planning (Johnson, 2003, p. 133). Here, as elsewhere in Sudan’s semi-periphery, it has been relative abundance rather than scarcity which has been most consistently associated with conflict. As Johnsonnotes,‘[i]thasbeenoneofthemajorironiesofthewarthat

the actual and potential wealth of southern societies, and the southernSudanasawhole–beitinland,livestock,water,oilor minerals– hasbeenthesourceof theirvulnerability’ (Johnson, 2003,p.75;Keen,2008).

Itisnotjustthiswealthandavailabilityofresourcesthathas driventhis patternofviolence,however,but alsoanunderlying politicaleconomicregime.InSudan,thisregimewasestablished by General Nimery’s 1970s ‘infitah’ economic liberalisation policies(Elnur,2008,p.40),whichopenedthedoortoArabGulf petro-dollars, in turnproviding thecapital foran expansion of mechanisedfarmingunderthesupervisionoftheIMFandWorld Bank. From then onwards, cultivating export-oriented crops beyondthetraditionalNilestatecottonplantations,andbecoming ‘Africa’s Breadbasket’, became central to Sudan’s development policy.Politicallythiswassustainedbysimultaneousprocessesof centralization,especiallythroughtheabolitionofcolonial‘Native Administrations’, and the commoditization of communal land throughthe1971UnregisteredLandAct.Builtonthethreepillars ofArabfinance,Westernknow-howandSudaneseresources,this globalisedprocess(Ayers,2010)of‘accumulation by disposses-sion’of traditional forms of subsistence (Abdelkarim,1992; cf.

Harvey, 2009) led toa constant but unsustainable agricultural expansionthatdepletedsoilsandotherresources(Suliman,1997), and fuelled the local conflicts discussed above. As Verhoeven (2011b) and others have point out, this developmentalregime continuestobereformulatedbysuccessiveSudanesegovernments tothisday.Itdeservesemphasising,though,thatthereproduction ofthisdevelopmentalregimeisnotonlyaproductofelitestrategy, butistightlyweddedinto,anddeterminedby,processesofglobal accumulation(Ayers,2010,2013).

Thelinkagesbetweenabundance,developmentandconflictin Sudanarenotspecifictoitspost-colonialhistory,however:they haveaverylonghistoricallineage.Relativewaterabundancewasa keymotivationbehindtheAnglo-EgyptiancolonisationofSudanin the1890s.Egyptiancottonproduction,socrucialtoBritishtextile productionandtheimperialeconomy,wasdependentuponand limited by summer Nile flows – which could not be further controlledorincreasedfromwithinthebordersofEgypt.Water development upstream of Egypt, and just as importantly the monitoringofirregularNileflows,thusbecamecrucialtoimperial strategy. Recognising this, Cromer characterised ‘the effective controlofthewatersoftheNilefromtheEquatorialLakestothe sea’asacentralmotivebehindtheoccupationofSudan(Cromer, 1908).Indeed,whileinterpretationsvary,somehavecharacterised theBritishcolonisationofSudanas‘essentiallyhydrological’inits aims(Tvedt,2011,p.174,also:2004).Whetherthisisthecaseor not,thelinkagesherebetweenwaterabundance,developmentand political violence are beyond doubt. Kitchener’s military cam-paignsuptheNile–culminatinginthe‘battle’ofOmdurman,at which11,000Sudanesewereslaughtered,againstonly49 Anglo-Egyptianlosses(HoltandDaly,2000,p.96;Lindqvist,1996,p.46)– andthesubsequenthalf-centuryofAnglo-Egyptiancolonialrulein Sudanwereeitherpartiallyorprimarilyrootedinhydro-political ambitions.Fromthecolonialeratothepresent,thelinksbetween water abundance,water development and violentconflict have beenarecurrentthemeofSudanesepolitics.

7. Conclusions

Wecannowrevisitoursixhypothesesinlightoftheforegoing. So, first: it is clearthat, at least geographically,conflict in the Sudanshasbeenmoreintimatelyassociatedwithlocal environ-mentalabundancethanwithscarcity.Thelocationofwaterand rain-fed agriculture-related conflicts in the Sudd, in the Nuba Mountains,acrossSudan’ssemi-peripheryasawhole,andindeed duringtheAnglo-EgyptiancolonisationofSudanalltestifythatthe

geographyofwaterabundancehashadlongstandingandenduring impactsonthegeographyofconflictintheSudans.Temporally,no equivalentscalelinkagesexist–forthesimplereasonthatnonew water resourceshave beencreated ordiscovered.Atcommunal levels,thereissomeevidencethatthedrillingofnewboreholesby aid agencies and NGOs regularly leads to conflict over newly abundantwaters(Workshop,2012).Bycontrast,atamore macro-level,theonechangeinwateravailabilitythatcanplausiblybe linkedtoconflict relates nottoabundance, buttoscarcity. The Sahel drought of the 1970s and ‘80s left a bitter social and economiclegacythatarguablyculminated,twentyyearslater,in the2003–2005war.Butbycomparisonwiththedirectevidenceof abundance-relatedviolence,thelinkageshereareindirect, time-laggedandinanycasecontestable.IntheSudans,conflicthasbeen much more directly linked to water abundancethan to water scarcity.

Secondly,however,thisdoesnotmeanthattheseconflictswere caused by ‘abundance’ – since local abundance only assumes importance,andonlyexists,relativeto‘scarcities’elsewhere.The JongleiCanalwasanattempttocapturetheabundantresourcesof theSuddonbehalfofagriculturalinterestsintheUpperNileValley, andtothisextentwasasmuchabout(visionsof)scarcityinCairo and Khartoum as it was about abundance to the south. For Kitchener’scampaignuptheNile,thesameapplies(thoughwith thequalificationthattheaimsofthiscampaignwereprobablyonly in part hydrological).In this regard water is no differentfrom diamondsoroil:allresource-relatedconflictsrevolvearoundthe relationsbetweenscarcityandabundance–‘scarcity-abundance’– andareneveraboutoneortheotherofthese‘variables’treatedin isolation. Theexisting quantitativeliterature on environmental andresourceconflictsisprofoundlymistakenintreatingthemas such.

Notwithstanding theabove,thirdly,theimportance ofthese water-relatedconflictsshouldnotbeover-stated:water,andthe politicalandeconomicrelationsassociatedwithit,havenotbeen theprimarydriversof conflictintheSudans.Oil ismuchmore importanttothetwocountries’politicaleconomies,accounting,in the South, for 98% of government revenues (Patey, 2010). Oil wealth sharing provisions were central to the Comprehensive PeaceAgreement.Andinturn,sincetheSouth’s2011secession,oil hasbeenthemajorsourceofNorth–Southpoliticalandmilitary confrontation,leadingformuchof2012toafull-scaleshut-down ofSouthernoilproduction.Water,bycontrast,isgenerallynota routetosubstantialwealthandpower.Itbarelyfiguredwithinthe ComprehensivePeaceAgreement(Rolandsen,2011,p.558).There have been no significant post-secession disputes over water-sharing.Andthereislittlesignofanysuchdisputescomingtopass. The central reason for this is that, within the context of contemporaryglobalcapitalism,waterisnotasourceofsignificant rents,orinturnasignificantpartofthearmouryofstateandelite power.

Fourthly,politicaleconomicdynamics,ratherthanchangesin resourceavailability,havebeenthemainproximatedeterminants ofenvironment-relatedconflictintheSudans.Theconstructionof theJongleiCanalwasdeterminednotbyanysuddenorsecular scarcity, but by political changes in Khartoum. Likewise, land appropriation in the Nuba Mountains was not a response to emerginglandshortages,butwasratherpartofastate-ledproject of expanding mechanised agriculture, and of ‘accumulation by dispossession’(Harvey,2009).Inbothcases,environment-related conflictoccurredintheabsenceof,orirrespectiveof, environmen-talchange.Thelatterisneitherasufficient,norevenanecessary, conditionforenvironment-relatedviolence.

Rather than environmental change, it is political economic factorswhichhavebeenthemaindeterminantsofwater-related violence in the Sudans. These factors have been at once local,

regionalandglobal.ImperialandcottoninterestsfirstledBritain downtheNile,resultingintheSudan’sforcibleintegrationintothe then British-dominated world economy, and in turn to the hydraulicdevelopmentandviolenttransformationofitscentral riverinestates. Egyptian-Sudanese collaboration lay behind the JongleiCanal.Andthemorerecentwaterandland-relatedconflicts across Sudan’s semi-periphery have all been determined by political economicfactors: by theglobalturn toneo-liberalism fromthe1970sonwards;bySudan’sextremeindebtedness;bythe influenceoftheWorldBankandIMF;bytheoilboomofthe1970s and‘80s;and,notleast,bytheinterestsofKhartoum’selitesandits liberalisingbut military regime. If representative,this suggests thatitislocalbutglobally-embeddedpoliticaleconomicprocesses –simultaneouslyprocessesofdevelopmentandstate-building– whicharethekeytounderstandingenvironment-conflictrelations inperipheralstatesliketheSudans.

Towhatextentmightthesefindingsholdtrue,andtowhatextent mightthismodelstillapply,undercircumstancesofglobalclimate change? Global Circulation Model projections offer little clear guidance: while on average they suggest small precipitation increasesacrossmostofSudanandSouthSudan,individualGlobal Circulation Model projections diverge strongly (for example, individual projections for Nyala in Darfur for the period 2040– 2069,suggestanywherefroma21%increaseinprecipitationtoa25% decrease:Bruggemanetal.,2010,p.41).Indeed,theonlychanges that can be predicted with any degree of confidence are that temperatures will rise, perhaps by up to 2.58C by 2040–2069 (Bruggemanetal.,2010,p.20),inturnincreasing evapo-transpira-tion losses; and that there will be an increased incidence of precipitationextremes. Other changes are also likely, including further increases in water demand stemming from population growthandagriculturaldevelopment,bothinternallywithinSudan andelsewhereintheNilebasin(especiallyinEgyptandEthiopia). Butthe potentialimpactofthese shouldnotbeoverstated.Yes, Ethiopiahasambitiouswaterdevelopmentplans,butthesedonot involvelargenetincreasesinwaterabstraction:themainpurposeof itsdam-buildingiselectricitygeneration,notirrigation(elHatow, 2012);andincreasedwaterstorageintheEthiopianhighlandscould conceivablylead,withinthecontextofanintegratedbasin-wide regime,tosignificant savingsfromthe 10bm3_{/year evaporation} currentlylostfromLakeNasser(Cheterian,2012;Verhoeven,2011a, p.12).Andyes,theNilebasin’stotalpopulationmaygrowbyas muchas53%by2030(UN,2012),butcontinuingurbanisationwill likely moderate the impacts of this on rural livelihoods. Nile ripariansalreadyrelyonvirtualwaterimportsmorethantheydoon theNileitself(Zeitounetal.,2010),andcouldmakeevengreateruse of such imports. The Nile is not inexorably becominga site of scarcity,letalonescarcity-inducedconflict.

Whatwill determinefuture patternsof environment-related conflictin theSudansis notsomuchtheleveloftheNile, nor climatechange, but thetwo countries’ political economies, the strategiesadoptedbylocalelites,andtheglobaldynamicsinwhich theseareembedded.Thelossofupto75%ofSudan’shydro-carbon incomefollowingsouthernsecessionwillrequirenothingshortof a re-invention of the Sudanese economy (Verjee, 2012). Sudan currentlyfaceshighunemployment rates,a highpublicdeficit, high inflation rates and high international debt, currently combined with an internationally-monitored austerity pro-gramme(ADBG,2013). Military expenditure alsoremains high, reflectingthecontinuingconflictsinDarfur,Abyei,BlueNileand SouthKordofan,andthemilitarybasisoftheKhartoumregime.As in the past, this situation could well inspire aggressive state strategies,includingtheviolentappropriationoflandandwater. InSouthSudan,equally,oilanddonordependency,thesizeof thesecuritysector(accountingfor40%ofgovernmentspending) and large-scale internal violence, including periodic military

engagementswiththeNorth,aresuchthatitishardtoimagine thatSouthSudan’sfuturewillbeanythingbutconflict-laden.Water mayquiteconceivablybepartofthis.Whilehistoricalexperience hasmadewaterdevelopmentschemespoliticallysensitive,eventhe JongleiCanalisnotrejectedonprinciplebythe SouthSudanese leadership(Ahmad,2008;SudanTribune,2009;Interview,2011a); andEgyptcontinuestoexpressitsinterestintherealisationofthe project(SullivanandNasrallah,2010,p.11;Taha,2010).Moreover, increasedagriculturalproductionhasalreadybeensingledoutas one ofthe cornerstones of the future SouthSudanese economy (GRSS,2011),whichwillincreasetheconflictpotentialofwater-rich land(UNHCR,2012),notleastifthesebecomesitesof‘landgrabs’by foreigninvestors(Deng,2011).Anyofthesedevelopmentscould haveviolentconsequences.

More generally, there is no reason tosuppose that climate changewillleadtoareversalofthedynamicsdescribedabove– either in the Sudans or elsewhere. The capture of relatively abundantresources,linkedtoprocessesof internalcolonisation andeconomicdevelopment,willlikelycontinuetobeacauseof conflict in the global periphery.Indeed, one implication of the aboveis that statestrengtheningand economic development– routinelyadvocatedby internationaldevelopment actorsasthe mainwaysofmitigatingresourcescarcities,andbuildingadaptive capacities–maysignificantlyexacerbatepatternsof environment-relatedconflict(Verhoeven,2011b).Ifthisisindeedcorrect,then themainconflictriskposedbyclimatechangeincontextslikethe Sudans might not be increased scarcity, but rather renewed patterns of exploitation and appropriation informed – or legitimised–bynewdiscoursesofclimatecrisis.

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