Every year in November, IHE Delt Master students enrolled in the course “Introduction to Water Hazards, Risks and Climate” play a climate negotiation simulation game, often during the same days of the real negotiations at the COP (the annual Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change – UNFCCC). The students are divided in teams corresponding to the different groups of countries involved in the negotiations: the European Union, the G77+China (the largest block of developing countries), small islands and insular states, oil producer countries. The US did not take part to COP30 in Belem (Brazil) and therefore were not included in the game this year. They were replaced by a US coalition of American majors and State governors. Other students play the non-state actors involved in the COP process, like fossil fuel lobbyists, civil society organisations, and the media. Usually, we organise a couple of negotiating tables on issues related to climate justice and finance, for instance the operationalisation of the loss and damage funds and who should pay for it, as well as on techno-political aspects such as climate mitigation and adaptation mechanisms.

The debriefing at the end of the game offers the opportunity to critically reflect on the relevance, challenges, and limits of the COP process and outcomes, including the role that scientific knowledge plays therein. This year we were particularly lucky as we got the opportunity to share our reflections and questions on the COP and climate diplomacy with Sherine El-Wattar, an Egyptian IHE Delft alumna who graduated in 2022 from the Water Governance programme. Sherine also served as President of the Student Association Board, and I am sure many remember the great speech that she gave in that capacity at the Graduation Ceremony of her batch!

Sherine currently works for the IPCC and got back from COP30 in Belem. just in time for her lecture at IHE. I invited her to share her experience in climate diplomacy, to observe and give feedback on the student’s simulation. The session was structured as an interview. Here below the questions and answers, that were followed by a discussion with the students.

Emanuele: What is your current role and work with the IPCC?

Sherine: I am currently the Science Network Officer of the IPCC Working Group II  (WGII) Technical Support Unit (TSU), This group works on Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability. My role is completely new for this group, and that means that I learned it by doing. Now, one year and nine months later, I like to describe this job as wearing two hats: the scientific hat, and the networking hat.

When I wear the scientific hat, I am part of the core science team of the technical support unit that supports more than 200 authors drafting the Working Group’s Assessment Report 7. My work includes: coordinating with author teams throughout the writing cycle; helping ensure scientific consistency and alignment across chapters; acting as the TSU focal point for the chapters on Water, Finance, and North America; and co-facilitating the Cross-Chapter Paper on Droughts. This side of the job is about precision, coherence, and making sure authors have everything they need to do their best scientific work.

Then there is the networking hat. This is all about engagement and relevance. Reports do not become impactful only when they are published, their influence grows throughout the writing process. This means I work on things like bringing in voices who are not typically involved in the IPCC process, or creating spaces where practitioners, youth groups, Indigenous experts, and non-nominated specialists can share insights.

Another part of my work is to design creative, informal, and formal ways to make the process more inclusive, and to ensure that stakeholders understand how the report is being developed and where their perspectives matter. For example, during the Special Report on Cities, I facilitated 10 thematic reviews for the First Order Draft. Each theme (finance, law, youth, Indigenous and local knowledge,…) was led by an external organisation that brought together its own disciplinary experts. I pitched the importance of leading this review to them and then coordinated invitations, webinars, timing, and reviewer registration to allow these groups to provide feedback from their unique perspectives.

This is just one example of what networking can look like. Some ways are official, others are informal, but the goal is always the same: to make climate science accessible, representative, and relevant.

E: How was your experience at the COPs?

S: My COP journey began in 2022, when Egypt hosted COP27. After finishing my master’s at IHE Delft, I returned home to apply what I learned in water governance to real-world policy. I joined the Egyptian Ministry of Environment’s organisation team. This was my first COP, not as a participant, but as part of the host country team.

Later, after joining the IPCC, I attended COPs again, this time in Azerbaijan and Belém, focusing on supporting IPCC side events, facilitating networking for the WGII Co-chair, engaging with practitioners and stakeholders, understanding global trends, gaps, and narratives to support the work of authors and the TSU. One of the most eye-opening parts of COP is witnessing the human side of climate multilateralism: the tension, the alliances, the fatigue, the subtle strategies, and the power dynamics that shape outcomes.

E: What did IHE students do well in the COP simulation and what is different in real life?

S: From what I’ve seen, I think that the students did exceptionally well in genuinely understanding the essence of negotiations: they seem to know what you can compromise on, what you cannot, and why.

They embraced roles that were not their own nationalities and still articulated realistic positions, identified gains and trade-offs, practised empathy, stayed open and respectful. But they were also stubborn when necessary, in a very diplomatic way. Their performance reflected the core spirit of COP negotiations.

I was especially impressed with the students representing Indigenous Peoples. They embodied the complexity of advocating for justice and recognition without having formal negotiating power. This mirrors the real COP dynamic where Indigenous delegates cannot speak in the governmental plenaries, yet they make a powerful presence.

Of course, the real COP negotiations are more complex. While the simulation captured the logic of negotiation, real COPs involve layers that are harder to simulate. Observing the students, made me thinking about a few points.

First, the tone can be more aggressive. Negotiations in real life include tension, sharp remarks, and sometimes dismissive or discriminatory comments; behaviours that should not be normalised, but do appear. Second, backroom diplomacy is everything. Lobbying happens in corridors, hotel lobbies, and informal gatherings. Not everything unfolds in plenary rooms.

Third delegations often arrive with pre-set positions. They already know their red lines and compromises before landing at COP. At the same time, alliances are fluid. Countries cluster by interest, but alliances shift year to year. Friends in one COP may not be allies in the next.

And finally, the size of national delegations often determines their negotiating power. This is one of the most overlooked equity issues and one of my biggest personal lessons. Small delegations – often from low-income or climate-vulnerable countries –  cannot attend long discussions running until 3am with only two or three people. Larger, well-funded delegations rotate shifts, maintain presence, and secure better outcomes. This imbalance shapes negotiation influence and final text outcomes more than most people realise.

E: Is there something that you learned at IHE Delft that you are applying in your current work?

S: My time at IHE Delft shaped not just my academic path, but also the way I move through the world. The most powerful lesson I learned was that you never exist in a silo. You are always influencing and being influenced by the system around you.

Being in a multicultural environment, surrounded by students who carry the challenges and strengths of their home countries, taught me that no problem is more important than another. Every issue has context, history, and meaning. Listening is essential. Real dialogue requires curiosity instead of assumptions. And compromise and meeting halfway are not weaknesses: they are governance tools.

Another special lesson was the importance of questioning knowledge. IHE profoundly changed the way I relate to science. In every lecture we asked questions such as: Who owns the knowledge? Who produces it? Who feels the knowledge is imposed on them? And most importantly: who benefits (and who does not) from this knowledge?

Today, whenever I encounter a scientific statement, I no longer accept it passively. I ask myself: has this been questioned before? What worldview does it come from? And what worldview does it ignore?

IHE also gave me solid technical foundations. I learned how to model and quantify things that are difficult to measure, how to interpret uncertainty, how to frame complex systems scientifically. Equally important, I learned to be aware of my own epistemological lens, the worldview through which I interpret science, problems, and solutions. That awareness is crucial, because my lens shapes the questions I ask, and the answers I give or accept. And it also shapes the biases I unknowingly bring into the room.

IHE taught me that water governance is not only about institutions and rules. Governance is about awareness of yourself, of power, of voices, and of the spaces where silence exists.

E. What advice do you have for master’s students who want to work on climate change?

S: My biggest advice is simple: start with yourself.

Climate change and water are fast-evolving fields, and they receive waves of global political attention that rise and fall. Some years, every country feels urgency; other years, the topic is pushed aside. If you choose to work in this field, you are choosing a purpose that rarely gives immediate returns. Change is slow. Progress is uneven. And this is why your internal compass matters more than anything else.

That is why it is necessary for you to know your values and your positioning. Ask yourself about the values you stand for and what you’d like to bring into the world of climate and water action. You can reflect on the privileges you have and do not have and how your experience has shaped how you see the world.

I would encourage you to stay curious, and question everything.

Finally, I would pray you do not lose hope! Working in climate change can feel heavy. You will sometimes feel the weight of global injustice, geopolitics, slow decision-making, and rising polarization. It is easy to feel depleted. At least I share that from my own personal experience. Your community, connections, listening to opposing views with motivation to learn something new, and voicing your perspective makes a difference.

A more practical advice is to find mentors you trust and who can inspire you. I would also tell you to try different domains within the field of climate change and see where you feel most passionate and curious. Try different domains: policy, science, governance, modelling, networking and see where you feel at home.

And finally, if you’re not aiming to become a scientist, own your role. Climate action needs coordinators, networkers, and bridge-builders just as much as it needs scientists (and often those roles are hybrid. These roles are often invisible but essential. After serving as the IPCC’s Science Network Officer, I see firsthand how coordination and networking shape the success of the entire global scientific processes. But with these roles comes responsibility to act with integrity, honesty, and respect. Trust is your currency.

In conclusion, walking back through the halls of IHE Delft as a guest lecturer, years after graduating was deeply moving. Sitting beside one my professors, Emanuele Fantini, and watching students negotiate in a simulation reminded me of how far I had grown and how much IHE shaped me. I am deeply grateful for the education I received there!

You cannot control how your career unfolds. The world is too complex, too dynamic for that. But you can control your values, what you stand for, what you devote your energy to, and how you show up. When you know that, everything else eventually falls into place!

The first time I saw the flood projection maps of Egypt’s northern coast, I froze. The blue shading that represented future inundation crept silently across the familiar outline of the Nile Delta. Over villages and towns whose names I recognized.

That moment stayed with me throughout my work on the report “Social Disruption and Migration due to Sea-Level Rise in Egypt”. The report emerged from the Egypt Sea-Level Rise Hackathon. An event organized by the Egyptian Ministry of Water Resources & Irrigation, the Egyptian National Water Research Center, and IPDC, a Dutch government-led initiative, facilitated by the Dutch knowledge institute Deltares. The report aimed to explore a deceptively simple question: How can a rising sea quietly reshape lives, driving social disruption and migration in Egypt and beyond?

The Crisis That Hides in Plain Sight

This study may have been designed as a rapid assessment, but for me, it became something much bigger. It opened my eyes to how differently sea level rise is understood across fields, from science to everyday life. When most people hear “sea-level rise,” they imagine dramatic moments like waves reaching coastal homes. The kind of scenes we see on social media. But a slow-onset crisis doesn’t arrive with a breaking wave; it moves quietly.

Even for those of us working in climate-related fields, the danger can feel distant. We often focus on models showing the year 2100 and think: “We won’t be alive then,” as if the crisis only becomes real when the map turns blue. I’ve heard experts who are fully aware of the science speak as though natural processes have no impact on people until homes are visibly underwater. It is almost as if the social consequences and human stories behind slow environmental change are invisible; a disconnect that leaves reality feeling far less urgent than it truly is.

For me, it felt as if experts and the public are standing on opposite ends of the same room: each sees part of the reality, but neither sees the full picture. That gap is dangerous. What if we don’t share the same sense of urgency and understanding? How can we build resilience together?

Saltwater is already pushing into the Nile Delta, not as floods, but as slow salinization. Farmland is becoming less fertile. Freshwater is turning brackish. Fishermen can no longer rely on their catch. Communities are already feeling the economic strain now. These are not projections but present-day realities. It is already reshaping livelihoods and touching the very heart of a nation’s economy. The Nile Delta that feeds millions now struggles under the combined weight of rising seas, land loss, and economic pressures.

What worries me most is how hard it is to see the boundaries of this crisis. When the change is slow, problems become intertwined: sea level rise mixes with pollution, land subsidence, governance, social inequity, and much more. Everything overlaps. In Egypt, we are witnessing a crisis woven into other crises. A crisis in a region that sustains more than 100 million people. And one that remains too under-researched for its importance. It is overwhelming! But that is exactly why we must give it attention now.

Listening Beyond the Maps

The core of this assessment was never about mapping where the water might go; it was about understanding what that means for people. I needed to explore who is vulnerable, in what way, and where.

Because the Nile Delta is not just another case study to me, I wanted to pay close attention to what people had to say. I wanted to hear real stories of coping and adapting. But doing that in a hackathon setting was far from easy. A hackathon is fast-paced, competitive, and focused on quick outputs. What I needed were grounded, in-depth and close-to-people conversations.

Most participants were engineers from government authorities. For many, the idea that sea level rise could drive social disruption or influence migration felt unfamiliar, even unnecessary. I still remember one senior official telling me, almost jokingly, “Oh, you’re here to fill the silly gap that’s now trending in our sector.” He meant the social dimension of climate challenges.

So, the very people who needed to help me connect to local communities weren’t yet convinced there was anything to uncover. My first challenge wasn’t data; it was opening a conversation and finding a methodology that could bring them along on the journey.

Turning Skepticism into Dialogue

After a serious game and an introductory session, the hackathon participants finally began to listen. They were not fully convinced, but at least open to the idea that we could work together. Sharing the same culture helped. For Egyptians, humor and movie quotes can break any ice. By engaging with them directly and encouraging their participation, I gained their trust enough to gather their input through a questionnaire.

Yes, the hackathon was competitive and answering the questions earned them points. Yet, they didn’t just rush through. Instead, I had meaningful conversations with most of the 36 participants, each of whom answered for at least two communities. A total of 76 answers for my questionnaire. Guiding them through the questions in person allowed me to explain what every choice meant and why it mattered.

Some discussions became much deeper than a questionnaire. One participant, from a family of fishermen, shared how catch has declined, reducing income and forcing many fishermen to venture farther into deeper, riskier waters, sometimes even beyond Egyptian boundaries, risking arrest due to shifting regional fishing agreements. He explained how hiring fishermen works, how fish are sold, and how their challenges have grown more complex over time.

Together, we traced a line connecting environmental change, economic pressure, and community well-being. He helped me understand the lived reality behind the data, and I helped him see how sea level rise and climate change are not distant threats, but part of what he and his community face today.

It was eye-opening for both of us. A true exchange.

Where Research Meets Reality

The hackathon was an experiment, a rapid way to generate insights and connect different disciplines. But its most important lesson, for me, was that data gains meaning only when connected to lived experience.

As researchers, we often start with maps and models. Yet, the people most affected by climate change start with memories, places, and relationships. Bridging those two worlds is where meaningful climate action begins.

For me, writing this report was not just an academic exercise; it was a reminder that understanding climate change requires more than reading maps or running model simulations. Sometimes, we need to look beyond the data and listen to the people who are already navigating the changes we study. Their experiences reveal parts of the reality that models alone cannot capture. Only by bringing those perspectives together do we begin to see the whole picture.

To explore the full findings, you can access the report “Egypt Social Disruption and Migration due to Sea Level Rise – Results from Egypt SLR Hackathon” here.

Water and humans exist in a dynamic, changing system of elements like hydraulic infrastructure, seasonal floods, energy demands, and conflict. Their shifting relations imprint themselves upon an emerging riverscape, whose shape, physical and imagined, interacts with narratives constructed along its banks. The term, employed by Tricia Cusack in her eponymous book, speaks to both the actual geography of a river and the cultural representations that are attached to it. 

These cultural representations are intertwined with political projects for using and exploiting water. Amidst the flux of riparian geography and human-nature relations, power is often expressed as control over the river’s flow. Hydrologically speaking, water, in the form of cubometers, is stocked, diverted and released by those with power. Ideologically speaking, the river is framed through narratives of belonging. Dams and heritage are two tools for expressing such control. 

I define heritage as the relationship a community has to an object passed from generation to generation, with an imagination of its role for the community’s past and future. Although heritage can be shared with others, it is often used to express exclusive ownership (see Muzaini and Minca, 2018 and Tunbridge and Ashworth, 1996).

Hydro-heritage pertains to our relationship to water and the objects it interacts with. Water is an essential part of life and a source of cleanliness. It is also amorphous, hard to control and sometimes dangerous. These attributes characterise the ways people relate to hydro-heritage (see Muehlebach, 2017).

In my MSc thesis research at IHE Delft, I looked at the representation of a dam in Bosnia and Herzegovina, a mountainous country where riverscapes are rich in heritage. This heritage, both natural and cultural, expresses stories of human ingenuity and resilience under conflict. I  explored the case of the Drina River and two neighbouring cities on its banks, one Bosnian and the other Serb, separated by a contested dam. 

Bosnia is split between a federal government representing ethnic Bosnians and Croats and an autonomous ethnically Serb government known as Republika Srpska. This is the result of the country’s 1992-1995 war for independence, in which the Drina was on the frontline of a bloody ethnic conflict, including acts of genocide.

In the post-war settlement, the two municipalities of Goražde and Višegrad, one majority Bosnian and the other Serb, were meant to co-exist along a shared riverscape. However, discourses of heritage have bolstered exclusivist claims to the basin and sidelined joint operation of the dam, which is located on the side of Višegrad. I sought to understand how these heritage discourses around the dam are constructed and how they are revived by local communities.

Dams and Heritage, Dams as Heritage

Much academic literature discusses how dams disrupt natural and cultural riverine heritage, altering the shape and flow of a river, inundating the upstream basin and disrupting livelihoods. In turn, the dam alters people’s imaginations of the riverscape. For instance, Amitangshu Acharya discusses how hydropower transformed the Umiam river in north-east India into a beloved recreational reservoir. When the local riparian ecosystem was threatened by siltation and pollution, campaigns to protect the Umiam rallied around its recent heritage as an artificial lake, rather than its natural state as a free-flowing river.

Dams may also be viewed as objects of heritage themselves, via their function and symbolism. The gravity dam’s form harks back to the monumentalism of antiquity— simple and elegant design, ingenious engineering, magnitude, and a vital role for human civilization. For governments, the portrayal of large hydropower projects as a nascent work of national heritage is convenient for controlling the basin.

Discourses of dams as heritage often employ parallelism to neighbouring sites of heritage in the riverscape. For example, Egyptian president Nasser celebrated the Aswan Dam musing: “In antiquity, we built pyramids for the dead. Now we will build new pyramids for the living” (Fahim, 1981, p. 14).  Dams are even portrayed as a positive contribution to the heritage of the riverscape into which they are inserted. The Aswan project was celebrated as an opportunity to study Nubian artifacts upstream, with UNESCO support, which would eventually be inundated by the dam.

Višegrad, Goražde and the “On the Drina” Hydropower Plant

The Drina River is treasured as one of the most beautiful and wild rivers of the Balkans, with towering canyons, endangered fauna, and a complex history. Over 1454-1878, Višegrad was a strategic commercial hub in the Ottoman Empire, as well as the site of Nobel-prize-winning author Ivo Andrić’s novel Bridge on the Drina. Andrić narrates changing boundaries, identities and flows that upend livelihoods amidst the constant backdrop of a 15th century bridge. The elegantly designed bridge connects the river’s Bosniak and Serb communities. Today a UNESCO-protected World Heritage Site, it was a focal point of multiple conflicts throughout the 20th century. Since the war, the city has been majority Serb. 

Forty kilometres upstream of Višegrad is the Bosnian Podrinje Kanton with its capital, Goražde. Goražde’s portion of the Drina is also rich in heritage. It is considered the cradle of both Orthodox and Islamic faith in Bosnia. The main bridge of the city’s downtown famously served as a cover from sniper fire during the siege of 1992-1995, a work of infrastructural heritage in its own right.

Launched in 1989, the Višegrad dam (officially named the Hydropower Plant « On the Drina », after Andrić’s book) is on the Serb side of the administrative border. It, along with two other hydroelectric power plants on the Drina, has significantly altered the river’s character. The once-turbulent Drina is now a series of lakes.

This change has brought both positive and negative consequences for the region. On the one hand, the river’s levels are steadier, and its reservoir, Peručac, is a popular location for tourism. On the other hand, higher humidity has led to complaints of respiratory illness and the migration patterns of endangered migratory fish, like the huchen salmon, is threatened. Previous lapses in coordination of the Drina’s cascading dams resulted in a devastating flood in 2010 and 2021. The brunt of the destruction was faced by Goražde— sandwiched between the “On the Drina” hydropower plant and a Montenegrin barrage upstream, it has no say in how the dams are coordinated. The most visible issue with the dam is the annual accumulation of a large “trash island” at its crest. Problems with water quality, a result of the obstructed river flow, is exacerbated by lax regulation of illegal landfills and low cooperation among littoral municipalities.

Hydroelectric power has long been a hot button topic in the Balkans. Its proponents in the government argue that it provides energy security and a source of income in mountainous communities facing economic stagnation. Indeed, large hydropower plants have an outsized role in Bosnian cities like Goražde, Jabalnica or Jajce. They are the main employers and are often the namesake for cultural projects, charities and football teams. In Višegrad, an entire historic district was built with the hydropower plant’s funding. It is aptly called Andrićgrad. The hydropower plant’s headquarters is in the center of the district, with a statue of Nikola Tesla (considered the Serb who first invented hydropower) across the street. The hydropower plant “On the Drina” additionally produces a series of documentary films for each of its anniversaries, which employ strong visual imagery to portray the dam as integral to the riverscape.

Visual research on people’s narratives of the dam

In my thesis, I analyse the discourse of these videos, which juxtapose the dam alongside sites of heritage in the riverscape. Bird’s eye footage of the hydropower plant, set deep within the Drina canyons, amidst naturalistic pan-flute music implies the dam is an integral, if not natural, member of the river basin. The video blends figures like Andrić and Tesla, the wartime struggles of the 1990s and  iconic sites like the Sokolović Bridge (see image below) to string a narrative of hydropower as part of the heritage of the Drina. It celebrates how the dam provided resilience in the war, while today it makes the river navigable and attractive for tourists.

Many residents  along the Drina, however, consider hydropower to be a cover for corruption and profiteering by the elite. Civil society, which has an active place in Bosnian society, has its own arsenal of graphic images of overtopping, flooding, and trash accumulation at the dam’s crown, to compete with the hydropower plant administration’s media narrative. Concerned about the effects on environmental flows, water table levels, pollution and public health, local activists argue dams are part of the problem.Representing different stakeholders, the HPP and the activists compete for the image of the riverscape. I employed video-elicitation, a research technique which uses visual prompts as the starting point for semi-structured interviews, to put them in dialogue. In my study, I showed excerpts from the dam’s documentary to residents in both cities, alongside photographs of the Drina and sites of heritage. Through this audiovisual medium, I sought to elicit a discussion on heritage without directly referencing it. Heritage is a polemic term in Bosnia that can provoke nationalistic biases when brought up in discussion.

The notion of the dam as heritage fell on flat ears. Some in Višegrad did describe it as a temporary fixture that has done good for their community. But few people in either city considered the dam a permanent element of the riverscape, worthy to pass on to future generations.  Whereas I certainly need more research to better understand the dam and/as heritage, my conversation with Amela Džafovic-Kešan, head of the Goražde civil society organisation “Eko-Habitat” is an important reflection of its current place in imaginaries of the riverscape. 

Amela’s organization campaigns against expanded hydropower and pollution of the basin. She views activism as a front for environmental justice, that is, equal and sustainable relationships to the Drina, which account for its complicated history and politics.

In light of what we watched in the documentary, Amela flat out rejected “heritage” as a corrupted term. She described it as a cheap play on nationalism, used for the profit of the elites in Republika Srpska. The Drina elicited a larger meaning for Amela than just heritage.  “Drina is not that. Drina is different,” she retorted. Looking out from the terrace onto the river, her face lit up.

“Drina is everything. Drina is life.”

Goražde’s shallow riverbank is reminiscent of the old, pre-dam river described in Andrić’s book. While Višegrad is set upon a deep reservoir, the river here remains free flowing, up till the edge of the city. The bright August sunlight, penetrating through the shallow emerald-blue waters, reflects off the shallowly submerged riverbed. Swimmers gather on the sunbaked rocks. Most wade along the banks, while the braver ones jump into the current, to be quickly carried downstream. Fishers set up on the boulders, shaded by the wartime bridge, a thoroughfare of pedestrian traffic in the evening. Truly, the Drina is “everything”. The word “heritage” angers Amela as a pejorative term for her river:

“It is not heritage. It is borrowed from my children. My grandfather lost his life there. Many others lost their grandfathers and fathers in the river.”

The Drina is a graveyard. But it is also the defining feature of the city to which Amela has devoted herself as an activist. It is the core identity of the only remaining Bosniak Muslim presence left along its banks after the war. And it is a place of joy, where the entire city empties out on a hot, summer day.

This rich, personal affect for Bosnia’s rivers —a source of life in peace and war, for both Serbs and Bosnians— motivates a deeper inquiry on how heritage, those elements with which we imagine our riverscape’s past, present and future, either competes with or embraces the infrastructure we build upon it. 

Few transboundary rivers capture the complex interplay of politics, livelihoods, and identity as vividly as the Helmand/Hirmand River Basin, shared between Afghanistan and Iran. People in the two countries refer to the river with different names: Helmand in Afghanistan – where its sources are located – and Hirmand in Iran – where it ends in the Hamouns transboundary wetlands.

Beyond today’s disputes, the Helmand/Hirmand has for centuries been a lifeline of civilizations. The river sustained the development of the Sistan civilization, but also agriculture, trade, and settlements that made the region one of antiquity’s cultural and economic centres. The Helmand/Hirmand did more than nurture fields and cities—it bound together communities across what are now national borders, weaving them into a shared socio-ecological fabric.

Within Afghanistan, the Helmand/Hirmand shaped the rise and survival of kingdoms in Kandahar, once and even now the seat of political power. Its fertile banks sustained populations and underpinned political regimes, and to this day the river flows through several provinces where it remains indispensable for communities, economies, and political constituencies.

Yet this river of civilization has become a river of contention in modern times. Despite the signing of a treaty between Afghanistan and Iran in 1973 after decades of disputes, the conflict over water allocation has persisted, triggering at time border clashes and trade disruptions. In the minds of many, the Helmand/Hirmand is no longer a symbol of life but of distrust, a headline of political tension rather than a source of cooperation.

A Basin of Contention, A Void of Collaboration

In such a politically charged context, the space for constructive engagement has steadily shrunk. Partisan narratives dominate public discourse, often distorted or unilateral. Research in both countries has been conducted in isolation, reflecting one-sided perspectives and reinforcing the partisan narratives. These dynamics deepen misunderstanding instead of promoting dialogue.

For two countries that share not only a river but also language, culture, trade, and centuries of social and intellectual exchange, this absence of collaboration is striking. Climate change and population growth are intensifying pressures, yet the lack of shared scientific understanding has left a vacuum filled by misinformation, public outrage, and hardened political narratives, obliterating important opportunities for generating benefits of cooperation that can help both countries in their struggle against water insecurity, ecosystem deterioration and economic crisis.

The Birth of NAIWS: A New Dialogue

To address this gap, the Network of Afghan-Iranian Water Scholars (NAIWS) was launched by IHE Delft – Institute for Water Education, under the Water and Development Partnership Programme. NAIWS is designed to navigate these turbulent waters through science, dialogue,, and personal connection. Its vision is simple but powerful: create a safe space where Afghan and Iranian scholars can learn, collaborate, and build trust around shared water challenges — particularly in the Helmand/Hirmand Basin.

From the outset, the initiative positioned itself as a form of track 2 water diplomacy. Unlike formal negotiations between governments, track 2 efforts convene scholars, practitioners, and civil society actors in informal, safe settings. Here, they can test ideas, build trust, and exchange knowledge free from political pressure.

The process was delicate. The call for applications was received with both enthusiasm and suspicion. Despite this, over 300 applied, reflecting strong interest from scholars and practitioners worldwide with roots in Afghanistan and Iran. Ultimately, 42 participants were selected: equal numbers from each country, with attention to gender balance, diversity of disciplines, and broad geographic representation. Importantly, all joined in their personal capacities, not as representatives of governments or institutions. This principle allowed them to set aside official narratives and instead explore joint solutions openly.

Objectives and Vision

NAIWS pursues three interlinked objectives:

• Capacity Development: Early sessions brought renowned scholars to share insights on transboundary water governance, conflict resolution, and climate change. This helped level the playing field, equipping members from varied disciplines with shared foundations of knowledge while simulating cross disciplinary dialogue among them.
• Online exchanges: Every two months, scholars present their research, exchange perspectives, and receive feedback in Dari/Farsi a language spoken in both countries.  Using a common language has made it easier for all members to engage in discussions in their own words, while also encouraging more open dialogue, reducing the sense of otherness and helping to stimulate deeper intellectual exchange and personal connection. These conversations have thus contributed to building mutual understanding and trust, fostering both intellectual exchange and personal connection.
• Joint interdisciplinary research: Cross-country research groups have been established, drawing on the experience of other similar initiatives at IHE — such as the Research School for Transformative Water Diplomacy — to study issues including climate adaptation, water resources management, and the socio-economic dimensions of water scarcity. The aim is not only to generate knowledge but also to foster trust through sustained collaboration.

Cultivating a Safe Space: From Distrust to Dialogue

The most significant achievement of NAIWS is not a publication or a workshop, but the shift in atmosphere among participants. At the outset, distrust was palpable. Many joined cautiously, burdened by national narratives and historical grievances.

Yet through carefully facilitated exchanges, often held under the Chatham House Rule to encourage candor, attitudes gradually began to change. Participants discovered shared concerns such as the impacts of drought on rural communities, the consequences of unsustainable water use and infrastructure development, and the difficulties of conducting research in fragile contexts.

Conversations that once reflected suspicion have become increasingly open and collegial. While certain topics remain sensitive, members of the network are now more inclined to focus on shared challenges and explore ways to address them collaboratively across the basin. Today, the tone is less reactive compared to when we started this project, though there is still a long way to go. Afghan and Iranian scholars exchange not only research but also professional experiences, personal challenges, and aspirations for the future. This transformation illustrates the very essence of track 2 diplomacy: even in polarized environments, trust can be built when safe spaces for genuine and respectful dialogue are created.

Track 2 Diplomacy in Action

NAIWS is a living example of what track 2 water diplomacy can achieve. While it does not replace formal negotiations, it complements them by developing a context of informed, connected scholars who may influence policy and future negotiations. It aims to produce credible, evidence-based research that moves beyond rhetoric, and building personal and professional relationships that transcend borders.

An initiative once met with skepticism is now acknowledged and praised in knowledge forums and conferences. For example, in June 2024, the International Conference on the Hamoun Wetlands in Tehran highlighted the role of NAIWS in fostering cooperation among researchers from both countries.

Looking Ahead: A Current of Hope

In a region where water has long divided, NAIWS offers a modest but meaningful example of how water can also unite. By fostering scientific collaboration and personal trust, the network shows that cooperation is possible and essential even in fragile environments.

However, this is just the beginning. Sustaining momentum, securing resources for joint projects, and translating trust into broader societal and policy impact remain major challenges. Yet the early results are encouraging: a group that began in distrust is now co-developing research, aiming to publish jointly, and even exploring proposals for collaborative funding.

NAIWS is more than a set of webinars. It is a growing ecosystem of collaboration, with activities ranging from virtual exchanges to capacity-building workshops, research collaboration, and potential joint publications. It aims to shape future policy dialogues and foster lasting impact between the two countries.

The disputes over the Helmand/Hirmand will not vanish overnight but incremental progress is being made through dialogue and cooperation.

The IHE Water Conflict, Cooperation and Diplomacy team works across regions to promote multiple tracks of water diplomacy through training, knowledge, and safe spaces for dialogue. This project is supported by the Water and Development Partnership Programme (WDPP), funded by the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

“From Tintin’s Gaze Back to Molana’s River” is a metaphor that came to me while reading a children’s storybook at home, in the middle of the intense work of moving our house, just as Emanuele Fantini invited me to present on this blog the new article that I co-authored with Olivia Mason, Muna Dajani, and Hussam Hussein. The storybook reflected on how local, traditional cultural figures have been replaced — first by European characters like Tintin, later by globalised icons like Superman and Spider-Man, and increasingly by the homogenising force of Hollywood’s capitalist culture. I realised how similar this shift is in my own field – water governance and diplomacy – where rooted traditions are displaced by technocratic scripts and capitalist narratives of water.

By “Tintin’s gaze”, I mean the outsider, colonial way of seeing — mapping and narrating rivers from afar. Tintin, the Belgian comic-strip character (first published in 1929), embodies the gaze that simplifies, objectifies, and speaks for others. By “Molana’s river”, I mean a rooted, relational understanding of water, tied to dignity, memory, and care. Molana — better known in the West as Rumi — was a 13th-century poet and mystic, whose wisdom of love and humility travelled across Central and West Asia, and whose legacy continues to inspire communities across the world.

What happens when the river no longer speaks the language of the lands it flows? When its water is mapped, measured, and monetised — not by those who drink it, but by those who observe it from above?

This sits at the heart of today’s water diplomacy. Scholars and practitioners in this field speak of “water cooperation”, yet much of the practice rests on foundations that exclude, erase, and extract, serving the broader neo-colonial system.

In our article, “Decolonizing Water Diplomacy for Justice”, my co-authors and I explore these foundations. We argue that water diplomacy in many regions — in our case, South West Asia and North Africa — has long been framed through a security–peace paradigm. This framing prioritises geopolitical stability and economic advantage, often upholding colonial-era arrangements or reproducing capitalist, Western-dominated logics, while silencing systemic inequalities and historical grievances.

This is the same contrast I highlight here: how rivers shifted over time from Molana to Tintin – from spiritual, communal, justice-rooted traditions to a technocratic script authored by consultants, satellites, and colonial logics. “Tintin” here is not a swipe at European culture; it signals the outsider gaze that narrates our rivers for its own audience — the simplifications laid bare by the colonial optics of Tintin in the Congo. I use these figures here just as metaphors to make our argument tangible. Our article itself speaks of colonial optics and epistemic dominance in the language of political ecology and governance, calling to centre equity and identity instead of security–peace framings. This blog translates that into a simple image: the move from Tintin’s gaze back to Molana’s river.

The Diplomacy of Displacement

The article raises fundamental questions concerning water diplomacy: “Whose interests does water diplomacy serve? Which ‘‘water’’ is its subject?” (p. 2). We argue that water diplomacy is not neutral. We call it “the diplomatic arm of global water governance” (p. 2) — the place where norms, finance, law, data, and development models come to the negotiating table. And the table is rarely level. Agreements drafted in the language of efficiency, peace and security too often serve geopolitical interests, ignore historical injury, and reduce water to a commodity. The result? A diplomacy that manages symptoms while leaving causes, including displacement, intact.

Here, “displacement” does not only mean the forced movement of people and water; more dangerously, it also means the displacement of justice, memory, and local voices by technocratic and colonial logics, all under the guise of modern science.

This architecture of displacement did not emerge in a vacuum. Modern water governance grew alongside imperial trade routes designed to secure extraction and circulation: from Bombay (now Mumbai) in India, across the Arabian Sea along corridors anchored by the Persian Gulf via the Strait of Hormuz, the Red Sea via Bab el-Mandeb (between Yemen and the Horn of Africa), and the Suez Canal in Egypt, linking colonial trade to European ports; routes whose strategic logics yet echo in today’s wars. Mapping, dredging, canal-building, and hydraulic engineering kept colonial arteries open. Today’s “neutral” instruments still carry those genealogies, privileging navigability, security, and investment over memory, justice, and repair. As we argue in the article, today’s water diplomacy remains shaped by those colonial tributaries of law, finance, and engineering (p. 7).

Across the neo-colonial world, communities encounter water not as a shared lifeworld but as a site of asymmetry, denial, and control. Consider the intertwined histories of England (and the wider British Empire) in India and the Netherlands in the Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia). That lineage lives on in modern “hydraulic mission”, as Northern expertise — Dutch delta planning and British-backed basin projects — travels globally: might be useful, but easily depoliticising when served from their colonial histories. Parallel dynamics surface elsewhere too — from hydropower and mining conflicts in Colombia, Congo, the occupied Syrian Jawlan and occupied Western Sahara for “green energy” and electric cars to caste, dams, and urban extraction shaping access in India to serve the luxury lifestyle (p. 3). At the other side of the same colonial coin, in today’s Palestine’s Gaza, the systematic destruction of water infrastructure and obstruction of basic services expose a brutal truth: when water is weaponised against a people, talk of “cooperation” without justice is not diplomacy — it is theatre; And we, as scholars and practitioners of water governance/diplomacy, must take care not to play a role in, or be the audience clapping for, this theatre.

Who Gets to Tell the Story?

In the article, we also argue that the dominant wisdom seeks to “frame water diplomacy as a knowledge deficit, through the narrative of ‘better data, better cooperation’”. And we highlight “how a decolonial lens [should] flips the question of how to improve data to asking who withholds or produces data, for whose strategic advantage, and whose knowledges are systematically erased?” (p. 2).

Much of today’s water cooperation is narrated (or taught how to narrate) by outsiders. Like Tintin or T. E. Lawrence (known as “Lawrence of Arabia”, the British officer and writer whose accounts of the “Middle East” reflected imperial fascination and power), they arrive curious, likely well-intentioned, equipped with tools — and with a storyline — but not with belonging. Add Google Earth and you have an eye in the sky that sees pipes but not pain; aquifers but not ancestry; canals but not claims. Their maps rarely capture the spiritual, political, or emotional meanings of water, yet they are routinely treated as “reliable” references to our stories.

To rebuild legitimacy, we – researchers, practitioners, and communities from the so-called “Global South” – can start from our own philosophers, poets, and civic traditions — not as nostalgia, but as alternative foundations. Water is memory as much as measurement. Molana, rooted in Sufi tradition, reminds us that rivers carry unity and humility; Ibn Arabi, an Andalusian mystic, imagines a world held together by relation; Mahmoud Darwish, the Palestinian poet, ties land and water to dignity and home. Farabi, the 10th-century philosopher known as the “Second Teacher”, and his concept of “virtuous city” centres ethics and the common good — a governance imagination where water is a public trust, not a private asset. Ibn Khaldun, the 14th-century thinker, shows how resource politics and justice shape each other — legitimacy erodes when extraction outruns accountability.

These currents resonate globally. Ubuntu in southern Africa (“I am because we are”) reframes basin cooperation as mutual becoming, not competitive allocation. In Latin America, Buen Vivir and rights-of-nature re-embed rivers in community and cosmos – a sensibility García Márquez captures in One Hundred Years of Solitude. Across South Asia, Kabir and Tagore imagine rivers as teachers; Different traditions, yes — but a common proposition: water is relational. It ties people to place, history to hope, and justice to the everyday.

And yet, as we argue in the article, the mainstream Euro-Atlantic traditions that underwrite modern governance — liberalism and Marxism — have offered powerful tools yet often centre the state, massive extraction, production, and control over nature. The aim is not to reject “the West”, but to de-centre any single canon so that rivers can be governed by plural philosophies and local sovereignties of meaning. Starting from different questions — not only how much and for whom, but who are we in relation to this river? What is owed to those displaced, those upstream and downstream, and those yet unborn? These starting points can reshape diplomacy from legalistic bargaining toward ethical settlement — one that honours memory, identity, and the more-than-human world.

Change the Philosophy, Change the Policy

Water Policy —and the diplomacy attached to it— already follows a philosophy, as we argue in the article (p. 7): predominantly a liberal-technocratic one oriented to security, markets, and managerial control. Our claim is different: let policy follow a decolonial philosophy centred on dignity, repair, reciprocity, and plural ways of knowing. That shift is not rhetorical; it changes what gets negotiated, financed, measured, and protected.

Drawing on conceptual analysis and case reflections in South West Asia and North Africa, our article outlines seven interlinked policy pathways to reframe diplomacy around justice (p. 7): redefining diplomacy’s goals around equity and identity not security and peace; dismantling neoliberal architectures; centring community-led governance; reforming funding; revising legal frameworks; measuring what matters; and prioritising South–South solidarity. Most importantly, we argue that decolonising diplomacy means reclaiming narrative power. Who speaks? Who decides? Whose river is this — and who tells its story?

Yet, we also acknowledge the challenge:

“These recommendations may seem idealistic in the face of centuries of colonial entrenchment and contemporary geopolitical realpolitik. Yet, it is this very improbability that underlines their necessity—for as long as diplomacy remains captive to colonial structures, water justice will remain elusive” (p. 8).

As we stress in the article, decolonisation must not become a buzzword. Genuine transformation requires courage – and sacrifice: to confront colonial legacies, to name injustices such as in Gaza, and to resist the silence of elites complicit in donors’ geopolitical agendas. Otherwise, water diplomacy is theatre, not justice.

If we wish to become “water diplomats” – or scholars of water diplomacy – we should be clear:

We are not water diplomats to perpetuate an unjust current or recolonise it. We are water diplomats to bring the flow back home — to uncolonise it. Otherwise, we are only administrators of displacement.

This shift is not about nostalgia or slogan — it’s about memory as resistance and storytelling as strategy even when fragmented and punished. The world’s rivers have always carried more than water: they carry names, griefs, songs, and futures. It is time we listen again — not just with data and numbers, but with dignity.

You can read the full article here:

Nagheeby, M., Mason, O., Dajani, M., & Hussein, H. (2025). Decolonizing water diplomacy for justice: Conceptual reflections and policy implications. Environment and Security, 0(0). https://doi.org/10.1177/27538796251362284

This book offers practical ways of engaging in interdisciplinarity within research projects, with the aim of fostering committed research on water in society. It is not a manual on interdisciplinarity. Rather, readers are invited to draw inspiration from the eleven stories presented here to reflect on and narrate their own interdisciplinary practices. The book does not prescribe the ‘right’ way to act or conduct interdisciplinary research but instead opens perspectives for imagining interdisciplinarity in society. The authors advocate a modest form of interdisciplinarity and call for recognition of the many ways in which it can be practised.

The book was conceived with the intention of giving an insight into the everyday practices of interdisciplinary research. It originated in the G-EAU mixed research unit in Montpellier (France), where a wealth of experience exists at the intersection of hydrology, agronomy, sociology and anthropology. The project arose from a desire to make researchers’ interdisciplinary practices intelligible and to bring them together—not necessarily to reconcile them, but to create space for debate about the epistemological, methodological and axiological differences that shape the history, identity and day-to-day life of our research group.

Dwelling in an interdisciplinary world

Living in an interdisciplinary world fosters encounters, provided we do not attempt to rank disciplines by importance or silence some in favour of others. The debate is less about interdisciplinarity itself than about the conditions under which it is recognised, encouraged and put into practice. Documenting such practices requires honesty and an intimate engagement with one’s subject and with fellow researchers.

Researchers are often required to tick the ‘interdisciplinary’ box when applying for funding, only to abandon or dilute the approach later due to lack of time or coherence. This generates both initial excitement and later frustration. Those who pursue interdisciplinarity are also regularly reminded—especially in competitive academic settings—not to neglect their discipline, which is seen as the guarantee of their scientific competence. Many researchers deplore the contradictions between interdisciplinary science programmes and the disciplinary organisation of human resources within academic institutions.

The wide range of definitions of interdisciplinarity reflects its unsettled nature. It may mean several disciplines working together towards a shared goal, borrowing methods and concepts to form an interdisciplinary perspective, or conducting research on societal challenges. There is no single approach. The aim of this book is not to unify or reconcile definitions, but to acknowledge and value this diversity.

Shedding light on the hidden dimensions of interdisciplinarity

One of the book’s aims is to highlight the often untold aspects of interdisciplinarity, offering those who practise it some points of reflection for analysing their day-to-day work. It addresses all those who engage with interdisciplinarity—whether in water research or in other environmental fields—by choice, by chance or by necessity; those who wonder about it; those who have long practised it; researchers from all (or no) disciplines; students curious about how environmental research is actually done; and research managers seeking to understand how interdisciplinarity might be evaluated and supported.

To contribute towards more appropriate evaluation frameworks, the book argues that interdisciplinarity is not just a method but a commitment with its own epistemology. Its ambition is not to provide a manual, but to illustrate concrete ways of practising interdisciplinarity. It is also a political project, seeking to make visible the need to create the conditions for researchers to engage in interdisciplinary work—work that is often exciting but also demanding—in a context where institutional frameworks remain deeply rooted in disciplinary traditions.

Water as an Object of Reflection

Water, with its social and physical dimensions, sits at the crossroads of disciplinary boundaries. The book suggests new ways of working on water, highlighting socio-environmental relations around pressing issues (such as pollution, groundwater salinisation, ecological restoration, technological optimism), across diverse regions of the world (Côte d’Ivoire, Cambodia, Morocco, Mauritania, France, Senegal). These case studies are examined through a broad range of disciplinary and interdisciplinary lenses: sociology, modelling, geography, anthropology, hydro(geo)logy, process engineering.

This diversity determines the premise of this book: interdisciplinarity is defined as we go along, depending on people, contexts, disciplines, methods, situations, observed phenomena and much else besides.

Eleven Stories to Reflect on Interdisciplinary Experiences

The methodological choice was to narrate interdisciplinary experiences as stories, rather than in conventional scientific formats that often disregard personal experience as part of knowledge production. The result is a set of accounts that are at once introspective and detached: stories in which the authors hesitate, falter and question themselves, reflecting honestly on the challenges of interdisciplinary practice.

Collectively, the authors concluded that bringing these stories together added real value. The narratives acted as mirrors, helping them reflect on their own practices and even serving as a kind of therapeutic support for the frustrations of interdisciplinarity. For while dialogue between disciplines can be joyful, it is not without its difficulties and discouragements.

A Book in Three Parts

The book is divided in three parts. The first, Negotiating Interdisciplinarity around Technical Objects, contains four stories in which interdisciplinary experiments are intertwined with technical objects such as treated wastewater reuse, drip irrigation and remote sensing.

Anne-Laure Collard (sociologist) and Nassim Aït Mouheb (process engineer) narrate the phases of their scientific encounter around wastewater reuse. Their dialogue produces a retrospective story that blends individual (disciplinary) and collective (interdisciplinary) viewpoints, showing how each small step shapes the relationship. This narrative allows to understand the long process of interweaving an interdisciplinary relationship, in which each small step is of fundamental importance, insofar as it then determines the right place for each person in the relationship. The result is an interdisciplinarity that makes no concessions, with rough edges but also joy and vitality.

Youssoupha Tall (sociologist), Jeanne Riaux (anthropologist) and Valérie Plagnes (hydrogeologist) recount how they came to understand the world of hydrogeologists. Their collaboration, moving from deconstructing initial assumptions to creating conditions for dialogue, illustrates how sociology, hydrogeology and anthropology can complement one another to avoid interpretative bias and deepen analysis.

Marcel Kuper reflects on drip irrigation as both technical object and social practice, showing how pipes and drippers anchor dialogue between disciplines. This story shows how an individual interdisciplinary approach is developed within a group. His account demonstrates how research objects shape interdisciplinarity, and how researchers in turn reshape objects through their political and social engagements.

Jean-Philippe Venot (geographer) describes his use of remote sensing – an approach that does not fall within his disciplinary background – in interdisciplinary research. He outlines his learning journey, collaboration with others. By reflecting on the various difficulties in his relationship with remote sensing, he accepts and discusses the discomforts in critically integrating such tools in the social sciences.

The second part of the book, Deploying Interdisciplinarity in Water-Related Territories, containsthree stories on interdisciplinarity as a field-based practice.

Véronica Mitroï (sociologist), Jean-François Humbert and Catherine Quiblier (ecologists) recount their interdisciplinary dialogue around cyanobacteria, where fieldwork acts both as the site and object of meetings and gradual coordination, between sociology and ecology on the one hand, and between scientists and water stakeholders on the other.

Ahmed Salem Mohamed and Christian Leduc (hydrogeologists) with Jeanne Riaux (anthropologist) describe a bottom-up interdisciplinary project on groundwater mineralisation, launched outside the usual donor frameworks. Free from external constraints, they were able to move beyond the friction and discomfort highlighted in other chapters of the book, and to develop a long-term collaborative vocabulary and method for what has become a new project centered around hydrology in society.

Carole Barthélémy (sociologist)and Jean-Michel Olivier explore the historical dialogue of disciplines around the restoration of the river Rhône. They show how political, social and climatic events spurred convergence, and how the river shifted from being treated as a physical entity to being recognised as heritage, enabling new interdisciplinary collaborations.

The third and final part of the book is entitled “Composing Your Water Discipline”. It gathers three personal stories on disciplinary grounding and the challenges of forging an interdisciplinary identity

Patrice Garin (agronomist) recounts experiences in Senegal and Madagascar, highlighting the role of emotions—shame, frustration, exhilaration—in shaping his interdisciplinary practice, and warning against the temptation of practising interdisciplinarity alone. Without questioning, criticism and perspective, and indeed interdisciplinary dialogue, what legitimacy is there in borrowing concepts and methods from other disciplines?

Jeanne Riaux (anthropologist) examines the place of social sciences in two projects led by hydrologists, framing her reflections through the notion of ‘care’ as a way of healing unbalanced interdisciplinary relationships.

Sylvain Massuel (hydrogeologist) describes how fieldwork across Niger, India and Tunisia made interdisciplinarity a necessity. His account emphasises the importance of openness, explanation, and encounters, while recognising that such opportunities are rare and cannot be externally imposed.

Bruno Bonté, together with Anne-Laure Collard (sociologist), reflects on the marginal status of his discipline, system modelling. His story highlights the discomfort of lacking disciplinary legitimacy but also the gradual reconciliation with a multiple scientific identity, enabled by dialogue with colleagues. The presence of a sociologist as a co-author in such a personal story, reflects Bruno’s point that reflexivity can always benefit from the dialogue across disciplines.  

Perspectives

The book was initially written as an opportunity for researchers to step back and reflect on their practices. It is now an invitation—indeed, an appeal—for others working on water or other environmental issues to share their interdisciplinary experiences, whether joyful or discouraging, stimulating or disheartening.

It calls for an approach to interdisciplinarity grounded in practice, without seeking to define once and for all what it is or should be. Instead, it affirms interdisciplinarity as one of the ways to deepen our understanding of the relationship between society and the environment, through the original insights that emerge when researchers with very different epistemologies meet.

Collard, Anne-Laure, Jeanne Riaux, and Marcel Kuper. Récits de recherche sur l’eau dans un monde interdisciplinaire. éditions Quæ, 2024.

The French version of the book is available in open access here. And an English version is in the pipeline !

The International Festival Fluid Interdisciplinarities and this post have been supported by the project “Interdisciplinary Journeys in Water Research” funded by the Water and Development Partnership Programme of IHE Delft. 

Last June, the IHE Delft Research Master in Water and Sustainable Development moved from a classroom to a theater. As a part of the “Philosophy of science” course, we attended the opera “Ring of our time” at the Holland Festival in Amsterdam. “Ring of our time” is an opera featuring forty artists from different continents and countries: Iraq, Nigeria, Mexico, Indonesia, and the Netherlands. It is produced by World Opera Lab, a collective led by Miranda Lakerveld, which revisits opera as a form of intercultural dialogue.

The “Ring of Our Time” refers to another ring, that of German composer Richard Wagner’s (1813-1883) cycle “The Ring of the Nibelung”. Inspired by northern European mythology, it tells the story of a golden ring that grants the power to rule the world. Characters compete to possess or destroy it, and ultimately, it is returned to the River Rhine. If the plot sounds familiar, it is because it has inspired many stories and productions. The “Ring of Our Time” updates this story to the present, bringing on stage the consequences of (neo)colonial practices of extractivism, including the exploitation of water and other resources. It is based on research and collaborations with communities, artists, and activists in Iraq, Mexico, Indonesia, and Nigeria. World Opera Lab organised workshops and residencies to learn about local cultural heritage and indigenous cosmogonies, and to expose the ongoing practices of extractions and pollution by external actors like multinational companies, which are affecting local ecosystems and societies.

We attended the show to learn more about transdisciplinarity, one of the topics of the “Philosophy of Science Course”. We found that this opera inspired meaningful reflections on integrating different disciplines and perspectives, one of the key concepts discussed in the course. The Ring of Our Time integrates different artistic forms, cultural expressions, worldviews on the relations between water and society, as well as cultural and political goals. These four forms of integration can inspire interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary practices.

Harmony

First, the opera is by definition an integration of different arts: music, singing, dance, theatre, and scenic design. In the opera, these arts do not lose their nature. On the contrary, they contribute with their own specificity to the whole show. A key element to achieve this is a common quest for harmony.

Researchers can be inspired by the opera approach, understanding the integration of different disciplines as a process where each approach keeps its specificity while adhering to a common goal and shared value. What could be the equivalent of harmony as integrating principle in inter or trans-disciplinary research?

Dialogic encounters

Second, the “Ring of Our Time” integrates stories belonging to cultural traditions from around the world. On stage singers sing in their own native languages, musicians play their traditional instruments, performers dance along to their distinct rhythms, and everyone wears typical costumes. They do not invent a new identity or aesthetic, but rather find a way to weave their stories, sounds, and dances into a coherent plot and a mesmerising performance. This encounter seems facilitated by the universal meanings that water assumes across cultures as a source of life and prosperity for communities and ecosystems.

This approach reminded me of another artistic expression across different cultures: that of the Nile Project, a collective of musicians from different countries of the Nile basin. Mina Girgis, the ethnomusicologist who founded the project, once explained to me the dialogic nature of their practice: musicians first listen to and learn about other musical scales, instruments, and rhythms, while sharing their own with their peers. Then they experiment and rehearse to find a way to play together. Similarly, interdisciplinary integration should be grounded into the specific potential and contribution of each discipline, and be practiced through a dialogic process. 

The Ring or the Thread?

Third, the approach inspiring the Ring of Our Time is that nature and culture, water and society are interconnected and should not be perceived as two separate systems, as often presented in mainstream European or Western worldviews. To convey this message, it confronts the image of the ring with another one: that of the thread. The ring hangs in the middle of stage and a devil-looking male acrobat maneuvers on it, recalling the stories of power and control of North European mythology and Wagner’s cycle. I associate it with the enclosure of natural resources and its unsustainable exploitation for the greed of the few. On the contrary, a thread, symbolised by a rope in the hands of the actresses, connects and heals the goddesses representing the different countries and cultural traditions. As explained by Miranda Lakerveld , this image comes from the Maya tradition of a sacred thread connecting communities “that was severed during colonial times. And there’s a prophecy that holds they will reunite in the future and restore the connection”.

The ring and the thread are ideologically in opposition, but they enter in an ambiguous relation on the stage through the characters who personified them. When commenting on the show with the students, we had different interpretations of a scene where the devil-looking acrobat embraces one of the goddesses lying on the floor: is he hugging or abducting her? This is one of the prerogatives of art, that provokes to reflect on the ambiguity of truth and remains open to interpretation.

In the end we found both the ring and the thread two meaningful metaphors to represent different forms and approaches to integration. The ring identifies the approaches that attempt to integrate and fit different aspects of reality into one all-encompassing model or system. The thread resonates with the call to think about interdisciplinary in terms of negotiation among different disciplines and their “coexistence in diversity” (Mol and Hardon, 2020).  

Call to action

The Ring of Our Time offers a fourth example of integration: that of art and activism, or aesthetics and ethics. The show was created through research and collaboration with groups and organizations. These groups, for example Save the Tigris in Iraq, take a stand for local communities and their rights to natural resources. As explained by Miranda Lakerveld, one of the goals of this opera is to denounce the neocolonial practices of resource extraction by multinational companies based in Europe or the US. In a post, Sylva van Rosse (a World Opera Lab collaborator), pointed out how the Ring of Our Time contributes to expose the contradiction of the Dutch foreign, offering worldwide its advice and expertise on water management to address problems that sometimes Dutch companies contribute to generate.

After the show, the students felt that they had been educated and moved to learn more and to act. Their comments point at the power of arts in terms of learning through emotions and justify the growing interest in transdisciplinary art-science collaborations for research and advocacy.

Attending the Ring of Our Time was an enchanting experience in itself because of the extraordinary quality of the show. For “informed spectators” like IHE Delft students and staff it also proved as a great opportunity to reflect on the opera as the art of integration to inspire our interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research.   

This post has been supported by the project “Interdisciplinary Journeys in Water Research” funded by the Water and Development Partnership Programme of IHE Delft. 

In the first part of this text, I set up a cliffhanger: how do we recognize a collective worth joining, or forming? And once we are part of a collective, how do we maintain it and realise its potential?

To answer these questions, I argue that a methodology of hope is needed. First, to recognize processes that constantly open the way to the world of crouching springs, and then a strategy to form communities and alliances to face great dangers and threats and give an unlikely opportunity to the world of crouching springs to (be)come ours.

Attention

The first principle of this methodology is attention. Not simply noticing, but a disposition of the soul, as Simone Weil puts it, a willingness to be awakened and altered. This sort of attention requires first that one is emptied of prejudgements, of listening just to be able to answer back. As the American writer David Foster Wallace argued in this commencement speech “This is Water” we often sleepwalk through life, tuned out, on autopilot. Hope begins with snapping out of that trance.

The second aspect of attention is the willingness to wait: waiting for relationships to mature, for words to be considered, for time to unfold. In Spanish, the word esperar means both to wait and to hope. This overlap is not accidental. It is with a proper disposition to be attentive that we can remain open and listen to the sound of whispers of change. Those whispers which, if we nurture and support, will reach high decibels.

Elucitading power

A second methodological component of hope is to elucidate the different facets of power.
The Dutch philosopher Baruch Spinoza argued in his Ethics that power can be understood in two ways. In Latin, power could be expressed as potere and potentia. This distinction is crucial. Potere refers to controlling, dominating power, the kind that subjugates. Returning to Tolkien’s allegory, this is the type of power embodied in the desire to dominate and centralize authority, as with the One Ring. This is the type of power that Foucault mainly warned us about and who spent his lifetime revealing all of its hidden mechanisms and expressions.

But fortunately, there is another form of power – potentia – which refers to the capacity to actualize potential, both one’s own and others’. Potentia flourishes when others also flourish. It is the power of co-creation, of nurturing potential, of mutual elevation. Contrary to potere, potentia does not seek submission but elevation. The realization of another’s potential does not threaten our own. It strengthens it. It is the energy of fellowship and solidarity, the power that grows in collective flourishing. Thus, understanding this duality is essential for a methodology of hope: not all power is corrosive. Some power enables, uplifts, and builds.

Recognizing potentia allows us to identify and align with forces that grow community and courage, rather than fear and control.

Searching for care

A third methodological component of hope is to search for care, where it exists and by whom it is practiced. Some would argue that the opposite of hope is hopelessness. However, I argue instead that its opposite is not hopelessness, but security. The etymology of security from the Latin sine cura — “without care” — represents a turning inward, away from others, away from risk.

And this brings us to a very important paradox: those who make their best efforts to play it safe, not to risk, not to fight for what’s right, to safeguard themselves, will end up losing everything, for they have stopped caring. And here lies an important paradox: those who strive above all to be safe, to avoid risk, to protect themselves from change or discomfort, end up losing everything, not because of external threat, but because they cease to care. They build trenches, walls, and moats to sever themselves from others, overrun by fear. The desire for security isolates them from the vital connections that make hope possible.

Caring, on the other hand, needs to extend a hand to the fringes of the unknown, of the risk of not being reciprocated, the risk of rejection, of vulnerability, of entering into solidarity with the weak and the excluded.

Caring, on the other hand, requires exposure and risk. It stretches a hand to the margins, to those who may not reciprocate, to those who carry wounds and weakness. Caring is inherently hopeful. It is only through hope that we take what is good in society and choose to defend it. Not because it guarantees success, but because it deserves care. As Foucault once said to a young interviewer shortly before his death, it is in defending what is good that we resist the cynical pull of despair. As Borges reminds us: “Love is the only thing keeping us from repetition.” Only through love and care can we break free of the gramophone effect, the grooves of history that endlessly repeat suffering and submission.

A strategy of hope

Now, it is necessary to explore hope as a strategy. I distilled a glimpse of a strategy of hope by reflecting on my research in Mexico, where three rural communities – Temacapulín, Acasico and Palmarejo – were able to face and win against a coalition of actors with more resources, tools, and power. From that experience I identified ten principles for any collective seeking to turn hope into change.

First, it is necessary to understand that even powerful persons need to act in alliance. If even the powerful requires coalitions to advance their interests, so too must the resisting, usually weaker, actors. Much harm has been done by popular stories summoning the need to change through “The One”: Harry Potter, Neo, Superman, etc. Although it is true that leaders are sometimes needed to stir thought and the spirit, nothing can be done without the support of the community behind them.Too much reliance on a leader will only lead to disappointment and frustration. Excessive faith in singular figures leads to collapse. On the contrary, the best inheritance of a leader is the offspring and decentralization of initiatives and collectives joined by a common vision.

Second, choose your alliances wisely. It can be hard to realize before joining which type of alliance is a collective of people. Perhaps Spinoza can help in this matter by categorizing alliances that are driven by the will to potere and the will of potentia. When alliances are driven by what Spinoza called sad passions — where secrecy, gossip, and power plays are common, and members treat each other with jealousy, self-righteousness, envy, and suspicion — we can read these as signs of ill-fated alliances. Sad passions drain collective energy. Whereas alliances driven by joyful passion, in which members treat each other as ends in themselves with a genuine joy of seeing each other blossom, are signals of alliances brimming with potential. These collectives are marked by affirmation, not fear.

Third, in all alliances, each member has a small or large roles, but all are crucial in the long-term process of the struggle of bringing about the world of crouching springs. It is an enormous mistake to undervalue small, invisible roles: each member of an alliance has a role, and each role is essential. Some take to the streets, others calculate, speak, negotiate, or maintain internal care. Simone Weil reminds us that the smallest attention is the highest expression of love. French philosopher, Badiou states the four utmost human dimensions where humans can exert critical changes: Art, Science, Politics and Love. Anyone exercising in one of these dimensions is playing a crucial role in any alliance for change.

Fourth, connected to points two and three, is the importance of exercising solidarity. Not one role is more important than the other, and the initiatives of a member of the community are embedded with unknown potential. Exercising solidarity means to support one another to allow for personal fulfillment and flourishing.

Fifth, the temporality of the actions that each alliance carries out has to be understood as a slow process that takes years, even decades of resistance. it is crucial to understand that this work takes time. The constant interaction and incorporation of new allies produce learning, shifting perspectives, and immaterial capital. Hope as a strategy is a long game. Its tempo is patience (“esperar para la esperanza“), what German philosopher Hanna Arendt calls “radical patience”. Alliances must build mechanisms to sustain themselves over years or decades without burning out. This includes rotating responsibilities, creating rituals of renewal, and celebrating incremental progress, so that the long arc of transformation does not exhaust those carrying it.

Sixth, that alliances will always at some point suffer setbacks, betrayals and moments of desolation. The worst thing is feeling alone in the struggle. Badiou’s “fidelity” is key here: continuing despite disillusion. Sometimes, true hope lies not in immediate action, but in holding space for thought and disorientation.

Seventh, there are critical moments, where abrupt and unexpected ruptures occur, where change comes like a dam bursting from a small crack. These breakouts are windows of opportunity that should not be missed, because it is impossible to know when they may return, so it is necessary to have a clear strategy on how to grab and take advantage of those windows of opportunity. These ruptures are kairos, moments of radical opportunity. Nietzsche calls them “untimely”, times when destiny stutters. Preparedness is key. We must be faithful to ruptures, to the radical moments when something new becomes possible, even if the odds seem stacked.

Eighth, alliances must be able to manage difficult decisions and have the capacity to recognize mistakes and internal strife. In other words, be ready to face internal conflicts and make a body full of (healed) scars. There is no easy solution, but the capacity to mobilize the spoken and written word in an agonistic and forward-looking manner is key. Conflict is like dirty dishes. Ignore it, and it piles up into paralysis. Face it, and the kitchen lives.

Ninth, German philosopher Ernst Bloch argued that hope is not passive daydreaming but an anticipatory consciousness, an active imagination that rehearses the possibilities of a better world before they exist. This “concrete utopia” is not a fixed blueprint, but a mental workshop where potential futures are visualized, debated, and emotionally inhabited. Therefore, alliances should create spaces — through art, storytelling, simulations, and role-plays — where members can practice the future they want to build. This strengthens resolve, clarifies shared goals, and inoculates against the paralysis of not knowing “what comes next” when small victories are achieved.

Tenth, in the end, the greatest danger is not the crumbling world itself, but the cynicism that convinces us it cannot be otherwise. Jewish survivor of Nazi concentration camps, Viktor Frankl, reminds us that suffering, when shared, can become a source of unity and collective resilience. Thus, alliances should create deliberate practices for sharing stories of hardship. Not to dwell in victimhood, but to weave them into the group’s collective identity. This turns pain into a resource for empathy, trust, and mutual commitment.

Saving power: grace and fidelity

This text has aimed to reclaim hope. Not as naive optimism, but as a rigorous philosophical and practical concern, essential in turbulent and dark times.

Where gravity pulls down, grace lifts. A crucial road to grace is through fidelity. Fidelity to a project, a collective, a spark of the possible. As Badiou writes, the imperative is to continue, not to let oneself be discouraged. From this fidelity, friendship s born. As the German poet Hölderlin beautifully put it: “Wo aber Gefahr ist, wächst das Rettende auch” (Where danger is growing, the saving power is growing too). From a personal communication with Christoph Kastelbauer, a German linguist, I learnt that the German word Rettende is not meant religiously. Instead, it has a social meaning. When someone or something outside your community is threatening you, people around you, who are not close to you, will become saviours in case of danger.

Hope, then, is not just a feeling or abstraction. It is a discipline. A daily return to fidelity. To continue walking with others when all paths seem blocked, to nurture what remains hidden beneath the ice. In this world weighed down by gravity — of despair, control, and survivalism — hope is a counterweight, a counter-conduct. It does not erase danger, but insists that danger is not the final word.

Hope as a strategy means choosing care over calculation. Attention over efficiency. Friendship over fear. It is slow. It is fragile. Let us listen, then, for the world of crouching springs, hidden, latent, dormant beneath the ice and fire of our age. And when we hear its whispers, let us respond not alone, but together as it is the only thing that has ever changed anything.

How to face the murky times that seem to be looming over the whole world? Clusters of wars, raging fires, socio-racial tensions, floods, and droughts spread across the globe, like an endless oil spill over the ocean. Sparks screech in the distance and screams sound like rumbles. Hearts are anguished and sources of cynicism peek through the cracks of the soul. Friends, acquaintances, and family scrape and scan the corners of society to find sources of Hope anywhere, and the best they can find is that they have to be thankful because things could be worse, much worse. What a consolation!

This world seems irredeemable. If that is true, all hope is lost. But as the Argentinian writer Julio Cortázar reminds us, “Nothing is lost if we have the courage to accept that all is lost and that we need to start again”. This apparent paradox points to a duality in how we experience the world. As argued by the Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben, some kingdoms are not of this world, but of a world that inhabits and is elevated through relations of grace that endlessly germinate sprouts of change everywhere in our base world; sprouts that are, however, almost always cut off by the gravity of the logics of our world.

Two traps

Actually, some people have become experts in understanding how the gravity that rules this convalescent world works. They know its murky logic and disgraced structures like the palm of their hands. For instance, the “successful” politicians and professionals who have managed to climb fast the ladder the social ladder and stay in power by calculatedly submitting to the powers that be, without ever attempting to exert any change of real value. They manage very well, not only to survive but to productively thrive in it like smoke kings reigning over the ashes of a ruined kingdom. This world’s experts have aligned their inner compass to the tricks and schemes necessary to blossom even in a world that continues to crumble. These people, often admired, tend to inspire envy more than hope; others would like to be so strong, so cunning, so smart, but the admiration goes only so far, as they would not want to work and grow together, but to use them (and be used) as human ladders.

This world often leads us to two familiar traps, one of the most important contemporary French philosophers, Alain Badiou, argued; it either leads to a YOLO attitude (you only live once -albeit empty-), or the fata morgana of climbing social strata. Both blind one’s judgment to even the most basic truths, including the dormant possibilities for connection and change.

There are others though, that at first glance may seem to be at the bottom of society (or at least not at the top); struggling just to make ends meet, but with an unwavering confidence and joy as if they would inhabit a different world —a world of crouched springs: latent, alive, hidden, waiting even in the harshest winters. They have great courage to trust that these saplings are there, even if we are unable to see them, squatted under crusts of ice, fire, and layers of forgotten sediments; to trust that these saplings, if allowed and cared for, can grow into lush forests. Take Dutch painter Van Gogh, for instance, he never sold a single painting in his life—failing to comply with the gravity and needs of success of this world. He lived his life in misery but remained committed to painting the most dazzling scenes of the world of crouching springs.

Most people remain caught between worlds; the only option they have is to be resigned to live by the gravity of this world’s rules, logics, and normative jouissance. They live in the world with a fatal resignation, knowing all too well the impossibility of hoping in a world of crouching springs they cannot believe in, not even fathom; they need to see to believe.

They are people with every intention of changing this world if they could, but they want to know that their effort is not lost or diluted in the tidal wave of pain and despair. But the impossibility of seeing immediate results—like a flower shoot trying to grow through a dense film of oil—shrinks the spirit. Gravity crushes. Sad emotions prevail in rooms with tall walls and tiny beds. They only have the energy to take care of their own, even at the cost of one’s own.

A mind trick to connect those two worlds that the Jesuits use comes to mind: “work as if everything depends on you but trust as if everything depends on God”. Shouldering the responsibility for the weight of action in a collapsing world is too much for any one psyche. Therefore, decoupling action from trust facilitates action that may (or may not) lead to changes. After all, how does one know in advance what action will have results?

But how can this “mind trick” be secularized? What or who to trust then?

When human figures are entrusted with the advent of crouched springs, their halo tends to fade into thin air. The Nazi concentration camps recorded the devastating effect on the common mood of prisoners when a revered figure surrendered to hunger and despair and appealed to base survival instincts (cfr. Zizek 2000). Another option is to rely on economic security (accumulation of gold, bitcoins, toilet paper, etc.), but the greater the desire for security, the greater the siege that is made to the other, to the fear of the intrusion of the stranger; sooner or later where five can eat, only two will be allowed to eat for fear of scarcity.

That is the strategy the rich implement to survive a perceived social hecatomb: buy isolated islands, build inviolable underground bunkers, and build distant and electrified-fenced ranches (see the real case of “Rich preppers”). But ultimately, no trench is infinite. Resources dwindle. The final defense will not be against armed strangers, but against a starving mother and her child. What’s endangered is not their safety—but their humanity. What remains is a shell of what they once were.

Therefore, the trust placed in people of flesh and blood will inevitably erode as we all face challenges where we do not always live up to expectations. The trust placed in material security isolates the heart and sours it, corrupts it. For every trust placed in a person who did not live up to that trust, the spiritual castle of the person who placed their trust is eroded and crumbled. For every trust placed in security, the heart turns to lead.

So what can be done when every visible anchor fails?

Grace, not strength

How does one find light, however calm, in a dark labyrinth with walls and sticky ropes stretched and woven over gloomy and hopeless corridors? the mind shuts down—unless it encounters another mind still lit. Where to find lighthouses that not only illuminate, but also transmit light? I argue that a clear strategy and methodology is necessary to be able to access the world of crouching springs. A first step perhaps is to recognize that we are not special, that, as Borges wrote, “He had, like all men, bad times in which to live.”

Then, following the literary tone, art and history can give valuable clues to find strategies and methodologies to unite the two worlds (the deteriorating world and the world that may be of crouching springs) through literary analysis. Tolkien, who lived his share of dark times during the war against the Nazis, wrote his magnum opus, “The Lord of the Rings”, as an interpretation of the world in which he lived. A dark world, which he had to live in, like all men, women and children.

In Tolkien’s telling, the threat of expanding fascism provoked dissidence and discord even among the resistance. As the influential French activist philosopher of the twentieth century Simone Weil argued, all people are susceptible to falling into the gravitational pull of the world we see. Relying on charismatic leaders as beacons was futile—many were corrupted or paralyzed by fear: the wealthy nations closed their borders and refused to accept and offer aid to the threatened nations. While other nations were only interested in how to lose as little as possible, unknowing that this path would lead them to lose everything.

The only way forward was to establish a community made up of an unlikely alliance of mad people and exiles forming bonds through the impossible mission of destroying the source of domination. Their power lay not in strength, but in grace—a constant flutter from the crouching springs. That community and the constant fluttering of the world of crouching springs provided them with the grace capable of lifting them in the face of the adversities that their path brought them.

They began hesitant, blind to their complementarity. But the journey, their shared vulnerability, and the authenticity of their small acts made grace tangible—and the impossible, achievable.

Grace, as understood by Simone Weil, is all that can elevate us against the gravity of this world. Complementing or unpacking grace, Badiou argued in this interview:

“Without faith, you have nothing. If you don’t have trust, you have nothing either. Because if you find distrust, you cannot have a positive relationship with the other, it will always be suspicious. So, the first point is trust, trust in the project, trust in the fact that it is possible to think of another world. Then, fidelity, because it is necessary to be together, to be faithful to that trust. It is not a matter of having it from time to time and by chance, it must be continued. The only imperative is to continue, not to let yourself be discouraged, not to give up, to maintain trust, because immediately that trust will encounter terrible obstacles, failures, impossibilities.

Giving up is the easiest thing. I think, then, that fidelity comes after trust and from within fidelity is created the friendly community of those who are faithful, of those who continue, of those who maintain trust. Friendship is the consequence of a common fidelity.”

So, when faced with the question of what to trust when times are dark, the answer lies not in metaphysics, but in practice—the formation of communities and improbable alliances of mad people and exiles feeling unease living in this world, but who can glimpse the twinkling of the world of crouching springs.

Improbable collective victories

Some will protest, “But these are only literary ideals, not real-world strategies”. Yet history is filled with improbable victories. An example is the case study of the conflict over the El Zapotillo project – a large dam in the centre of Mexico, stopped by a small community of people with unwavering hope in a different future. Faced with a tangible and seemingly unstoppable threat from an actor clearly much more powerful than a trio of rural towns, the latter were successful after 17 years, as I argued in my PhD thesis. Other cases across the world also resonate (many of them contained in Martínez-Alier’s “The making of world movements for environmental justice”): Cochabamba in Bolivia, which reversed the privatization of the city’s water service; and other grassroots movements that consolidated collective action against the backdrop of imposition of large infrastructure such as in India (Narmado Bachao Andolan), USA (Standing Rock Sioux vs. the Dakota access pipeline; Belo Monte), and Honduras (Gualcarque River and the Lenca People). Although not all grassroots movements were able to stop large-scale projects, the movements brought about global scrutiny and increased the global awareness of indigenous rights, environmental justice and fossil fuel infrastructure.

From this, we can infer two non-negotiable conditions for hope in action: to work as if everything depends on you, and to trust as if everything depends on the collective.

The next question follows naturally: how do we recognize a collective worth joining—or forming?

Click here to continue reading Part Two

The Water and Development Partnership (WDPP)-funded project “Cross-regional learning for transformative water diplomacy (CroWD)” aims to create and nurture a community of open-minded and engaged early-career and advanced scholars researching transboundary water across Asia, Africa, Europe and Northwest America. As part of CroWD, a research methods school brought together young scholars from Afghanistan, Finland, India, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Nigeria, Sudan, the US, and Uzbekistan to train them in critically engaging with different approaches and understandings of water diplomacy and develop adequate analytical frameworks. Building on the momentum after the first Research Methods School, held in Almaty, Kazakhstan, in 2024, a second one took place from the 31st of March to the 1st of April 2025, in the vibrant city of Kathmandu, Nepal.

The school brought together participants from diverse cultural (e.g., Middle East, South and Central Asia, West and East Africa, Europe, and Northwest America) and disciplinary (e.g., science, engineering, social sciences, geography) backgrounds to learn water diplomacy research methods from different perspectives and thematic angles. The aim was to continue the mission of providing early career scholars with essential analytical tools for better understanding water diplomacy research. The main questions that participants are trying to answer altogether are: How can we study water diplomacy? And how can its transformations happen? This meeting served as a continuation of the first training, promoting a more thorough examination of multidisciplinary methods, comparative research, and collaborative learning in addressing transboundary water governance.

The program focused on three key learning objectives: i) understanding and applying interdisciplinary approaches in comparative research; ii) applying diverse quantitative and qualitative methods for data collection and analysis, and iii) communicating and collaborating effectively in interdisciplinary teams. Through interactive sessions, group exercises, and peer feedback sessions, participants gained hands-on experience in integrating different research methods and perspectives. For example, to bring comparative, single and multiple trans- regional case study and various discursive research techniques. The hybrid format ensured inclusivity, allowing both in-person and virtual participants to engage meaningfully. Beyond technical skills, the Kathmandu gathering fostered a strong spirit of collaboration, encouraging young researchers to bridge divides and co-create meaningful and sustainable solutions for the shared water challenges of our time.

The first day of the school set the stage for understanding the importance of interdisciplinary approaches in research design. A key highlight were the group presentations, where the five research groups shared their ongoing work and received peer feedback. The topics included:

• Group 1 focused on how the presence of refugees influences conflict and cooperation over shared water resources in Yarmouk, Lake Chad, and Helmand basin.
• Group 2 examined the cultural and spiritual connections to water quality in Ganga- Brahmaputra- Meghna, and Columbia transboundary river basins
• Group 3 explored the role of technology and data transparency in enhancing cooperation between states sharing water resources in Aral Sea, Mekong, and Blue Nile basin.
• Group 4  concentrated on collaborative approaches to mitigating water-related conflicts and enhancing security in Rhine, Zambezi, and Amudarya river basins.
• Group 5 investigated how climate change impacts discussions and policies surrounding transboundary water governance in Lake Chad and Aral Sea Basin.

Later in the day, the young researchers were introduced to social science methods for data collection, including qualitative interviews and quantitative surveys. Dr. Jenniver Sehring, Associate Professor of Water Governance and Diplomacy at IHE Delft and Alyssa Offutt, a PhD student at IHE Delft guided participants through practical exercises, helping them refine their skills in qualitative and quantitative data collection. Participants were able to understand those practical value of these approaches, for example, how critical discourse analysis helps to understand power dynamics, and narrative analysis allows for a deep exploration of human experiences applying in practical settings through rigorous research training among those groups.

The second day of the school delved deeper into advanced research techniques, with a focus on discourse analysis and narrative analysis. Dr. Medha Bisht led participants through the intricacies of critical discourse analysis, encouraging them to rethink how language and power dynamics influence water diplomacy. For example, how culture (both symbolic and language) as a medium of communication can facilitate dialogue (power) in transboundary water diplomacy (Bisht and Ahmed, 2021). This session prompted participants to reflect on how to incorporate discursive methods into their own research on transboundary waters.

The day culminated with a group reflection session, where participants shared their revised research design and discussed the next steps in their projects. The opportunity to work on methodological planning and receive constructive feedback from peers was invaluable in refining participants’ approaches. As the school wrapped up, the group discussions and reflections ensured that each participant left with not only enhanced research skills but also a clearer direction for applying these skills in the field.

As the school concluded, participants also mapped out the road ahead for their collaborative research. Each group was tasked with developing a work plan, with the goal of completing their research projects by the end of 2026. Fieldwork is expected to begin this year, with study visits planned either this year or the next, depending on each group’s needs and timelines.

As the Transformative Water Diplomacy Research Method School wrapped up in Kathmandu, Nepal, it left participants with more than just research skills, it sparked fresh inspiration and meaningful connections. Beyond learning new methods and approaches, the school built a supportive network of emerging scholars dedicated to addressing shared water challenges. With stronger collaborations, broader interdisciplinary perspectives, and a shared commitment to cooperation, participants left equipped and motivated to bring these insights into their work, fostering more sustainable and peaceful solutions in transboundary water governance. 

As the Research School took place back-to-back with the 7^th Water and Peace Seminar, which resulted in the Kathmandu Declaration on Inclusive Water Cooperation, it could directly build upon these discussions in an effort to connect political practice with academic education to make both more meaningful.

The Research Methods School is part of the Cross-Regional Learning for Transformative Water Diplomacy (CroWD) Project funded by the Water and Development Partnership Programme of IHE Delft. 

In the months following the 7^th annual Water and Peace seminar held in Kathmandu, the 2025 IHE Delft Young Water Diplomats (YWD) led a collective reflection on concrete steps to strengthen inclusivity and participation in the water cooperation space. Building on the momentum of the Kathmandu Declaration on Inclusive Water Diplomacy, the cohort prepared a policy brief that offers actionable recommendations for policymakers in the water sector.

The 2025 YWDs comprise a group of 18 emerging leaders from 14 countries across Africa, the Americas, Asia, and Europe with diverse academic, professional, and lived experiences from the water sector, but also international relations, diplomacy, conflict resolution and governance. The policy brief is the result of reflections from the Water and Peace seminar in Kathmandu, developed jointly after a series of self-organised online consultations and multiple iterations to ensure a fair, equitable and meaningful representation of views, perspectives, and lived experiences of the cohort.

The document draws from a wide array of best practices and lessons learned from diverse themes and geographies, including basins such as Lake Titicaca, the Nile, Syr Darya, and countries such as Guinea, Liberia, Yemen, Australia and Jordan. The brief focuses on three specific areas for action, identified by the group as the core focal points emerging from the Kathmandu seminar:

• Youth: Institutionalising dedicated youth engagement platforms, creating intergenerational dialogue initiatives; facilitating mentorship and youth participation in decision-making processes; and ensuring sustained financial and technical support to youth-led organisations.
• Women: Enhancing efforts to generate and share gender-disaggregated data; strengthening policy frameworks to ensure women’s equal status; and expanding networking and capacity-building efforts for women.
• Indigenous and Traditional Ecological Knowledge: Investing further in local dialogue platforms together with indigenous people; and empowering citizens via TEK-informed community based monitoring.

The authors of the brief conclude that:

Advancing inclusivity in the water sector requires more than rhetorical, political, and diplomatic commitments. The threats to the global consensus on the inclusivity and participation agendas of the 21^st century are unlikely to abate anytime soon. Should policymakers deprioritise this cause, water diplomacy and cooperation interventions will lose sight of the actual needs and aspirations of the communities most affected by their decisions. Those working in this sector should not revert to business-as-usual approaches, and we should avoid a return to technocratic approaches that reinforce the power and position of those who gained it through historical injustices.

Historically, 2025 may be remembered as a turning point in the international system, where we must decide whether to continue struggling for a more plural, diverse, and inclusive world, or to yield to the powerful political and economic actors working to derail our pursuit for a more just and equitable future. The 2025 YWDs see this product as an opportunity to share fresh perspectives and ideas with a broad range of government, civil society, and other stakeholders working to promote inclusivity and transformative changes in water diplomacy and cooperation.

You can download and read the full policy brief here.

The Young Water Diplomats Programme is part of the Cross-Regional Learning for Transformative Water Diplomacy (CroWD) Project funded by the Water and Development Partnership Programme of IHE Delft. 

When the Nile Runs Thin 

The Nile has been Cairo’s lifeline for centuries, shaping both the cityscape and its eco-social fabric. Yet today, this ancient waterway carries the weight of geopolitical tensions that stretch across eleven countries and 6,700 kilometers. Upstream, Ethiopia’s Grand Renaissance Dam and other massive infrastructure projects alter water flows, while downstream nations like Egypt negotiate for access. Climate change adds another layer of uncertainty—unpredictable rainfall patterns, prolonged droughts, and rising temperatures affect the entire basin.

These distant conflicts and global forces translate intimately into everyday realities on Qursaya Island, where fishermen like Arafa navigate not just the river’s physical currents but the daily consequences of diminished fish populations, altered seasonal rhythms, and an ecosystem forever transformed by Egypt’s own High Aswan Dam, built in the 1960s.

Here, geopolitics becomes deeply personal: fewer fish mean smaller catches, changing water levels complicate boat navigation, and the river that once brought abundance now demands new forms of adaptation and resilience. What happens in boardrooms in Addis Ababa or climate conferences in distant capitals ripples down to the nets cast at dawn, the conversations shared over evening tea, and the livelihoods sustained by hands that have worked these waters for generations.

Building the Dream

As the date of the Nile Parade approached, our weekly meetings with the artists and the team of VeryNile, an environmental NGO, intensified. There was so much to coordinate—from obtaining the most challenging security permissions to renting the land that would host our visitors, to organizing music workshops for the kids, fishermen’s workshops, and the decorations for the boats. Many moving parts, all happening simultaneously.

Alongside our planning meetings, the “Kids of the Nile” who are the children of the fishermen, women at VeryNile and residents of Qursaya island, met every weekend with Egyptian musician and singer Youssra El Hawary to create songs drawn from their daily lives on the island. As the event came closer, their excitement and confidence grew. We had promised to take them off the island to record their songs in a sound studio—something that thrilled them beyond measure.

Week by week, challenge after challenge, we found solutions, and the mosaic of the Nile Parade slowly came together. Watching it all materialize, I kept thinking: this is a dream about to come true!

The Weight of the Ritual

Last year, I held the first Nile Parade with no visitors – just the Qursaya community. I was proud, but I knew there was more to be done to make this a true ritual. How do you build a ritual if it doesn’t happen again and again? This year was our chance,but also a test. Would people come? Would they connect with it? What problems would arise, and how could we handle them?

In moments of stress, I often asked myself: Why did I leave my camera behind to organize all of this? Why am I investing so much energy? What difference will it make?

Voices of the Water

Two weeks before the parade, we planned the second fishermen’s workshop—this time not just to discuss their relationship with the Nile but to co-design their participation in the parade. 

Researcher Yasmine Hussein, Head of the Research Department at HCSR, led the session, working with thirty fishermen to express their stories not just in words but also through drawings. They illustrated their thoughts, their challenges, and what the Nile means to them.

At first, participation was reserved. But as always, by the workshop’s end, rich conversations unfolded. They debated types of fish, numbers, techniques, problems—everything. These discussions were goldmines of insight.

One key activity was gathering messages from the fishermen to be printed as signs on their boats—some were calls to the public, others were deeply personal expressions about the Nile. These were sent to Ammar to be transformed into boat-flag designs.

The Collaboration

While all this was happening, preparations were in full swing: cleaning the land for the open air exhibition, stage and booths, testing the boats, finalizing decorations with artist Ammar Abo Bakr. 

Arafa, one of the fishermen who became Ammar’s favorite collaborator and assistant, brought natural materials from the island, shared ideas, and even had loud arguments defending his creative vision.

The prints for the EverydayNile exhibition have arrived, along with two photographers who participated in the EverydayNile exhibition: Curity Adhiambo from Kenya and Sarah Hagag from Egypt. 

For the exhibition curation, I decided to go big—literally. We printed the photos as large as our budget and space allowed, the scale and feeling of the Nile in various countries. The exhibition featured ten stories from ten Nile Basin countries, captured by ten different photographers.

Moments of Recognition

Two unforgettable moments stand out from the building of the exhibition. The first was when Abo Sayed saw his picture printed large alongside his granddaughter. His happiness and pride were unmistakable. We printed two pictures as evidence of the first Nile Parade, and to welcome visitors to the island. The second picture featured all the fishermen, who gathered in front of it to spot themselves and share the experience with their families or take photos next to it.

The second memorable moment occurred when I tested one stand with a large image of Ugandan boats on the shore, in an empty area. During a break from the fishermen’s workshop, the fishermen came over and began discussing the boats. They debated the type of wood used and which country they might be from. Most of them were illiterate, so they couldn’t read the captions, but the image resonated with them. That moment confirmed for me the powerful emotions that pictures can evoke. I planned to take the fishermen on a private tour the next day when the exhibition opened.

The Final Countdown

The days flew by. Materials crossed the Nile, spaces were built, and the registration cap of 300 visitors was quickly reached. Though we wished to welcome more, this being only our second public parade, we decided to close registration for safety and control. If it succeeded this year, we could grow slowly over time.

One day before the parade, the Kids of the Nile crossed the river together, off to record their songs in a Cairo studio—a reward for three months of hard work.

Simultaneously, we transferred boat decorations to the island and began constructing the installations: decor for boats and land, a stage for the kids, lighting, sound systems, and different booths for Daym’s eco-education, recycling workshops, home-cooked food, and EverydayNile’s space.

As the final touches came together, people started requesting exceptions to attend the event after registration had closed. The building team worked through the night. The weather forecast warned of the coldest day of the year, with no sun and possible rain. We had no plan B. We hoped for the best and braced for anything.

On the morning of the parade, we were still chasing final security permissions. The weather held—for now.

The Day Arrives

Visitors began arriving, crossing the Nile on VeryNile boats. Fishermen gathered around the giant photographs, discussing, debating, and guessing the locations. A group stood in front of a life-sized photo of a hippo—an animal that once lived in Egypt’s Nile before the High Aswan Dam was built—snapping pictures with their phones. Children read captions aloud to each other.

People mingled and interacted, networking, exploring the exhibition, and photographing the photos. Over 200 visitors arrived. We opened the day by explaining the story behind the Nile Parade, its aims, and what people could expect.

We scheduled two Nile Parades and two performances by the Kids of the Nile. During the first parade, I climbed to the top of VeryNile to photograph from above—a shot I’d missed last year. From there, I saw the boats approaching, music playing, people lining the Nile, clapping and singing along.

After the parade, we gathered on land. The stage was ready. The kids performed four original songs they composed and rehearsed with Youssra. It was their first time performing for an audience. As more visitors arrived, to our surprise, state media showed up, including Nile TV, even though we had agreed to keep media presence limited.

The Rhythm of Celebration

I watched as people wove between the photographs scattered across the island. Some paused to read the captions; others snapped selfies beside the prints. New visitors arrived while others slowly began to leave after the first parade and performance. The weather, surprisingly kind, defies the forecast—no rain, not too cold, just right.

Passing the photo of the hippo, I overheard two visitors reminiscing about a time when hippos once roamed the Nile in Egypt, before the construction of the High Aswan Dam in the 1960s. It was a quiet reminder of how the river’s ecosystem has changed and how distant some memories have become.

Small groups gather. Some people sat quietly, soaking in the last rays of the sun, enjoying the view of the Nile. Children danced, music spilled into the air, and laughter rose between conversations. Others struck up discussions with the fishermen or enjoyed the beautiful homemade food by Um Nada, one of Qursaya’s residents and the chef of the local kitchen Shoka w Mogdag.

At the EverydayNile table, prints from the exhibition are laid out as postcards. Elders and children huddle together, writing messages to the Nile—reflections, wishes, memories triggered by the images.

From the Water’s Edge

The second parade was about to begin. The fishermen move slowly to their starting point, guiding their boats into place. This time, I joined them. Onboard with other media members, I prepared to witness the procession from the water. The fishermen buzzed with energy, and on the riverbank, the crowd gathered again—lining up to welcome the parade as it glided by, accompanied by a live band playing from one of the boats.

From this vantage point, I could see everything up close—the pride in the fishermen’s faces, their sense of agency over this place, their home. And I saw the joy they sparked in others. Friends waved. Strangers clapped and smiled. The atmosphere was vivid, vibrant, almost surreal.

As the boats returned and the parade drew to a close, we were drawn to another performance: the children singing once more with Youssra. There was something grounding about this repetition—a cycle of celebration and community.

As I step off the boat, I overhear someone say to a friend, “It’s strange… the Nile is always here, but we never celebrate it. Why did we stop?” His words echo in me. Why did we stop? And more importantly, how do we begin again?

The day ended on a high. Media reports were already circulating. The fishermen were smiling. The visitors were buzzing. The VeryNile team glowed with satisfaction. As I prepared to leave the island, Alban, the founder of VeryNile, stopped me. “Let’s meet to plan the next parade,” he said.

And just like that, I realize—we can do this again. And again. We can revive this ritual, this celebration of the Nile, and fold into it a deeper purpose: to protect it, to appreciate it, to listen to its stories and its silence.

Messages flooded in. People shared how much the day meant to them. Some who couldn’t come send notes of regret. As for me, my only wish is that I have had more time to take photographs. I miss being behind the camera. But I did manage to capture some moments, just for myself. I don’t want to let go of that part of me. After all, it was a photograph that started all of this—a single image that led me down the path of researching the myth of the Bride of the Nile, of exploring rituals and their place in society. One picture that connected it all: the fishermen, VeryNile, the artists, the children, and ultimately, this revived Nile Parade.

The Deeper Current

A week later, I find myself in Arafa’s boat again. We were working on another layer of the project—exploring biodiversity around the island. As we drifted, he reflected on the parade. “It made everyone on the island happy,” he said. “People are still talking about it. My kids, my family… we want this to happen again and again.”

Then, as we rowed quietly, the sound of water lapping around us, Arafa turned to me and added, “You know, that was one of the only times we fishermen gathered in such large numbers. It’s not that we don’t see each other, but all together like that? It just doesn’t happen. Two fishermen who were in a fight—hadn’t spoken in a long time—they made peace that day. It was a good moment for all of us.”

We continued our tour around the island. Arafa pointed out the species that live here, quietly introducing me to the more-than-human world we share this river with.

And in this moment, drifting with Arafa, I realise again: this is what ritual can do—it can bring people together, and maybe, just maybe, remind us of how to live alongside the river again.

The Nile Parade in 2024 happened as an initiative as part of my research and master’s thesis programme, where I collaborated with VeryNile. We fully sponsored the event. In 2025, the Nile Parade took place thanks to a grant from Creative Development, Media in Cooperation and Transition (MiCT)  and IHE Delft Water and Development Partnership Program.

Every time I return to the Nile, I am reminded that its story is never-ending. It is fascinating how everything here is deeply interconnected — water, people, history, science, and the environment. Last December, I returned to Qursaya, a small island on the Nile in the middle of Cairo, with a notebook full of ideas. One of my main goals was to prepare for the Nile Parade on the occasion of Nile Day, usually celebrated every 22nd of February by the eleven Nile Basin countries.

I started the Nile Parade last year as part of my Master’s research on myths, rituals, and their connection to environmental sustainability. Inspired by ancient Egyptian traditions, the first Nile Parade was fully voluntary, made possible by the enthusiasm and dedication of those who joined me—artists, fishermen, children, women of Qursaya, and the team of Very Nile, an environmental organisation based on the island and focused on cleaning the river and raising awareness about plastic pollution. Though it was a small community celebration rather than a public event, the first Nile Parade resulted in a powerful  reaffirmation of the deep connection between people and the river.

Why Qursaya?

For years, I have been working on stories about the Nile, but I came to realize that no single project could capture its full complexity. The story of the Nile never ends. It meanders, branches, and loops back, always revealing something new. Instead of attempting to tell the whole story at once, I decided to zoom in, focusing on a single place that could serve as a microcosm of the Nile itself.

Qursaya Island is that place. Located in the heart of Cairo — a city of over 22 million people — it remains a world apart: a community of fishermen and farmers, accessible only by ferry or the small boats of the fishermen. The VeryNile project, which collaborates with fishermen to collect plastic waste from the Nile for recycling, adds another layer to its significance. So does the Pharaonic Village, a tourist attraction that mimics life in ancient Egypt. That’s why, for me, Qursaya feels like a microcosm of the Nile—a place where past and present coexist, where environmental degradation meets grassroots action, and where a community shaped by the river now grapples with its deteriorating ecosystem. Here, you can witness the full spectrum of the Nile’s realities: cultural memory, ecological damage, economic struggle, and local resilience: all surrounded by water, yet still confronting water scarcity.

This time, I arrived with a long to-do list, eager for new knowledge and discoveries. Alongside planning for the Nile Parade, I also wanted to deepen my research on the water and the Nile around Qursaya, this time in direct collaboration with the fishermen themselves

The Fishermen Workshop: A Conversation on the Nile

As a part of this research, I organized a workshop for the fishermen, to create a genuine collaborative exchange instead of merely using their experiences to implement my vision. Collaboration is a delicate balance, and I wanted to ensure that this was a space for shared knowledge, not just a one-way process.

To facilitate this, I partnered with urban sociologist Saker El Nour, and together we organized two workshops that brought together 31 fishermen from Qursaya and a neighboring island. The initial goal was to give voice to the fishermen, centering their lived experiences on and around the Nile. We aimed to engage them in the preparation and participation in the Nile Parade by listening to their stories, understanding the challenges they face, and hearing their own ideas for solutions. We didn’t know what to expect, but the conversations that unfolded were more insightful than we had imagined. It became a special and meaningful moment: for the first time, many of the fishermen — who normally only cross paths briefly on the island or in their boats — gathered in one space. It was a space not only for sharing but also for disagreement, debate, and dialogue, a forum that allowed for collective reflection and, perhaps, the beginning of a shared voice.

One of the most striking moments was when Saker opened the discussion with a simple question:

“What is your most memorable moment on the Nile?”

“I once caught a fish that weighed 15 kilos. That was many years ago.”

Mohamed, one of the fishermen, was the first to answer. From there, the room came alive. One by one, the fishermen started recalling their biggest catches: 6 kilos, 10 kilos, even 17 kilos! But these stories were all from the past. Today, every single fisherman in the room works with VeryNile, collecting plastic waste rather than relying solely on fishing, because the fish stock in the Nile has declined drastically.

Another eye-opening moment came when Saker distributed printed images of different fish species and asked the fishermen to identify which ones still existed in the Nile. This simple exercise sparked intense discussions about names, species, and whether certain fish had disappeared entirely. It was a powerful way to reactivate our memories and make us reflect on how the Nile has changed over time.

After the workshop, Saker and I sat in a café, sipping tea and reflecting. We were both struck by how engaged the fishermen had been. Their knowledge was profound, and they saw details about the Nile that often go unnoticed. This experience made us even more eager to expand the project, to let the fishermen guide us through their Nile, sharing their knowledge about fish, water, and life on the river. One idea that emerged was to create a “Manual of Life Around Qursaya”, documenting their observations on species, microorganisms, water quality, and the daily challenges they face.

A Water Tour with Arafa: Learning from the River and the Fisherman

Parallel to this, I had also invited Omar Magdi, a PhD researcher from Delft, to join me in exploring the water quality around Qursaya. We planned a preliminary sampling campaign to collect water samples from several locations around the island, Borrowing simple water testing tools from IHE Delft lab, we set out on a journey with Arafa, a leading fisherman and friend from the island, to collect the samples and better understand the condition of the river.

 For three hours, we navigated the Nile in Arafa’s small boat, stopping at different points to collect water samples. The results were striking. Some areas were highly polluted. Others had unusual colors. Some samples contained silt from the riverbed. Others, taken from the middle of the river, appeared relatively cleaner.

But beyond gathering samples, this trip became an unexpected masterclass in river ecology. As we floated along, Arafa shared story after story, pointing out invasive species, explaining fishing techniques, and identifying which native species had disappeared. His knowledge, gained from a lifetime on the water, was as valuable as any scientific study.

Back at VeryNile, we worked on interpreting the samples and the captured photographs about water quality. We conducted both analytical and microscopic tests.

Our findings indicated potential pollution at certain sampling points, likely due to a combination of inadequate sanitation services on the island, direct disposal of household waste into the Nile, littering along the banks, and the lack of effective waste management infrastructure. While this serves as an important indicator, further research with a structured seasonal campaign is necessary to gain a comprehensive understanding of the situation.

What’s Next? Preparing for the Nile Parade 

At this stage, I decided to pause my water experiments and focus on the upcoming Nile Parade celebration. This year, we planned to expand it further, introducing a performance by the fishermen, a “Kids of the Nile” show, and an #EverydayNile photo exhibition. With a team of over 20 people we all worked hard trying to make it happen.

Beyond that, my longer-term research on Qursaya is only beginning. I want to continue working with the fishermen, scientists, and artists—bridging traditional knowledge with contemporary environmental research. Every time I think I have reached a conclusion, the Nile proves me wrong. It is an endless stream of connections, ideas, and discoveries.

To be continued…

Roger Anis is artist-in-residency at IHE Delft within the Aquamuse project.  Funded by the Water and Development Partnership Programme, Aquamuse is led by the Living Waters Museum (India) and involves artists, researchers, museum curators, and educators in Egypt, Sudan, Ethiopia, India, and Burkina Faso.

Around 60 participants from more than 20 countries gathered earlier this year in Kathmandu for the 7^th Water and Peace Seminar, and many more joined online. The Water and Peace Seminar is a flagship event of IHE Delft’s water diplomacy activities under the Water and Development Partnership Programme (WDDP). It annually brings together scientists, policy makers, practitioners, and representatives of civil society to share their experiences and expertise on water diplomacy.

The 7^th Water and Peace Seminar, with the title “Diplomacy, Dialogue, Discourses: Exploring potentials and challenges for inclusive water cooperation” aimed to mobilize ideas about increasing participation by people, giving voice and agency to ecosystems, and integrating different sectors in water diplomacy. During two days, presentations, panel debates, and discussions allowed to gain a deeper understanding of the challenges to reach inclusiveness, learn from experience at different levels and in different settings, and elaborate strategies to foster broader participation, cross-sectoral integration, and more equitable representation in water diplomacy.

Led by our partners from the NGO Save the Tigris, participants of the seminar jointly drafted a declaration to reflect the essence of the discussions and translate them into concrete calls for action.

You can read the text of the Kathmandu Declaration below or download it here. We hope that it serves as an open invitation to diverse actors to reflect on their roles and actively participate in fostering inclusivity in water diplomacy and water cooperation, tailored to their regional contexts and specific roles.

Kathmandu Declaration on Inclusive Water Cooperation

Preamble

Water cooperation among different users, sectors, and countries is essential for harnessing the benefits of shared water resources, preventing and mitigating conflicts, and addressing the challenges posed by climate change, environmental degradation, and human overuse of resources, among others. Water diplomacy, as we understand it, is a process of empowering and representing diverse voices and transcending traditional negotiations by integrating the interests and needs of both state and non-state stakeholders in water cooperation. However, diplomatic processes are often constrained by dominant interests and narrow perspectives of a few powerful actors. Therefore, to achieve true inclusivity in water cooperation, we must rethink established norms and embrace relational and holistic ways of thinking when addressing crucial issues such as water, food and energy security, biodiversity preservation, wetland conservation and climate resilience.

The Kathmandu Declaration is a result of the 7^th Water and Peace Seminar held in Kathmandu. It serves as an open invitation to diverse actors to reflect on their roles and actively participate in fostering inclusivity in water diplomacy and water cooperation, tailored to their regional contexts and specific contributions.

This Declaration is based on:

• The acknowledgement that a comprehensive approach to water governance must integrate various intersecting issues;
• The need for innovative solutions and adaptive strategies in water diplomacy to meet evolving challenges;
• The recognition of the importance of state sovereignty in water governance while balancing it with the need for regional cooperation;
• The acknowledgement that inclusivity is fundamental for ensuring diverse voices and perspectives in water management and governance, hence in both operational and political decisions on water;
• The recognition that inclusiveness extends beyond NGOs to include academia, media, research institutions, grassroots movements, local communities, and non-human actors;
• A strong belief that true democratic engagement requires the active involvement of community representatives in water governance decisions, also regarding transboundary issues;
• The acknowledgement of the difficulties civil society and local communities face in engaging with formal governmental processes and negotiations, which limits their influence on water policy;
• A concern about how current geopolitical conflicts and tensions can disrupt water diplomacy and hinder collaborative efforts among nations sharing water resources.

We, participants of the 7^th Water and Peace Seminar, commit and call actors involved in water diplomacy and water cooperation to the following articles.

Article 1: Commitment to inclusive water cooperation

• Advocate for participatory democracy that actively engages local communities, indigenous groups, civil society organizations, gender and disability representative groups, marginalized groups, and private sector actors in water governance decisions, especially in transboundary contexts.
• Advocate for solutions that provide mutual benefits, emphasizing that cooperation can strengthen state sovereignty while contributing to sustainable management of shared waters.
• Foster a culture of collaboration by encouraging collaborative practices and conflict resolution mechanisms that enhance mutual understanding and foster peaceful dialogue among countries sharing water resources.

Article 2: Embracing diversity beyond human actors

• Advocate for the inclusion of all living entities within water ecosystems, integrating biodiversity considerations into water cooperation.
• Promote the recognition of rivers and ecosystems as key stakeholders in water diplomacy, ensuring their integrity is considered.

Article 3: Further development of tools for participation

• Emphasize the necessity for robust legal frameworks that promote cooperation for effective implementation of agreements on shared resources.
• Encourage the integration of diverse stakeholders, including civil society, local communities, and non-state actors, into the processes and decision-making structures of international water conventions and basin treaties to ensure comprehensive and equitable water governance.
• Advocate for adaptive governance models within these treaties that strengthen inclusive practices and facilitate dialogue among all parties, so that the needs and perspectives of all stakeholders are addressed.
• Identify and tackle barriers that hinder participation, including through training and capacity-development for marginalized voices.
• Support structured participation mechanisms that facilitate input from stakeholders, including local communities and youth, and take into account cross-generational considerations for sustainable water resource management.

Article 4: Building the basis for transformative water diplomacy

• Emphasize the need for increased investment in Track Two and Track Three diplomacy, which facilitates informal, non-governmental dialogue and cooperation among conflicting parties (Track Two) and among the broader public (Track Three).
• Develop and promote innovative, flexible, and creative environments and frameworks that enable informal actors to participate meaningfully in water cooperation and complement formal diplomatic efforts.
• Promote efforts to build trust and overcome social and cultural differences among diverse stakeholders, facilitating more unified and cooperative efforts.

We call for concrete measures to

• Mobilize funding and resources to enable effective participation and influence in water cooperation and diplomacy of civil society, local communities, and marginalized groups.
• Reduce restrictions on civil society activities imposed by some governments, cultivating a more supportive environment for these actors.
• Support the advocacy of working with nature, emphasising ‘soft’ nature-based solutions rather than ‘hard’ engineering options where this is possible, in respect of the voice of nature and non-human beings.
• Make essential data on river systems and related human activities more accessible in order to strengthen the agency of non-state actors.
• Support the formation of stronger networks and alliances to unify voices from different human and non-human actors, enabling more effective collaboration and advocacy in water diplomacy.

This Declaration was jointly drafted by participants of the 7^th Water and Peace Seminar, taking place in Kathmandu, Nepal, and online on 26-27 March 2025. 

A few weeks ago, IHE Delft Master students discussed the injustices and legal intricacies of the Israeli occupation of Palestine after watching the Oscar-winning documentary “No Other Land” (2024), directed by Basel Adra, Hamdan Ballal, Yuval Abraham, and Rachel Szor.

The film tells the story of the Masafer Yatta community on the West Bank, where Israeli forces illegally demolish homes in the villages on a weekly basis. It is the largest single act of forced transfer ever carried out in the occupied West Bank. For half a decade, Basel Adra, a Palestinian film director, lawyer, and activist, films the gradual expulsion of his community. He is joined by Israeli investigative journalist and filmmaker Yuval Abraham, and the two young men become close friends as they film together over the course of five years. This despite the inequality between the two, Basel living under occupation and Yuval, being free to travel as he pleases. The film reveals the everyday brutality of military occupation, depicting the non-violent struggle for their rights by this Palestinian community in the face of sometimes deadly violence.

Why we watched this film

The screening took place in the mixed week during which students of the MSc in Water and Sustainable Development learn and practice communication skills. In introducing the documentary, Emanuele Fantini listed three reasons for watching it in class. First, because it is a beautiful film, as testified by the multiple awards it received: besides the Oscar, in 2024 it also won the prize for best documentary at the Berlin Film Festival and the European Film Award, and many other awards in festivals all around the globe. One of the reasons explaining this success is that by following the work of Basel and Yuval, the film tells a much-needed story of friendship and commitment, in the face of a situation on the ground deteriorating every day, with the military escalation and the widespread violation of even basic principles of humanitarian law by the Israeli army moving away any prospects for peace or hope in justice.

The second reason is that it is a very sad story. A story of violence, injustice, loss and death. In other words, it is a war story. Screening this film is an act of solidarity with the victims of war – all the wars that have touched IHE Delft community in different ways – and particularly those forgotten by mainstream media or undocumented because journalists do not get access or are targeted. Since the beginning of the war between Hamas and Israel, in October 2023, about 170 Gazan journalists have been killed, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists, making Gaza the most dangerous place in the world for journalists. One of the film directors himself was attacked in March 2025 by Israeli settlers, then arrested by the Israeli army and released after having been beaten while in prison.

The third reason for screening the film is exactly because it is both beautiful and sad. Such a contrast offers meaningful food for thought to reflect on the role of media and stories in communicating and acting on complex and contested topics in difficult and polarised contexts. Watching the film with a multi-cultural and multi-disciplinary audience like that of IHE Delft MSc students and faculty proved as a privileged opportunity to acknowledge, listen to, and engage with different perspectives and emotions on the same story.

Telling the human story of occupation

After the movie, Gabriela Cuadrado Quesada moderated the discussion between students and guest speakers: the filmmaker and former journalist Faten Bushehri, and the international lawyer Gregory Townsend. One student commented that the film shows the human side of the story rather than the facts and figures we are used to seeing from the media. And Faten Bushehri confirmed the power of that perspective: “This is the very reason I switched from journalism to filmmaking to show the human costs and injustice of inequality in the Arab region”.

Faten Bushehri warned the audience to critically reflect on the language used by the media to frame the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. For example, when news reports say “Palestinians died”, but “Israelis were killed”. In the film, we witness how the Israeli settlers twist the narrative, accusing the Palestinians of “invading a tank training ground”, whereas it is the Israeli army that is displacing the Palestinians, who own the land and have lived and worked on it since the 1800s. Towards the end of the film, a leaked memo reveals that the use of the area as a tank training ground is a pretext to expel the Palestinians. Litigation against the bulldozing of homes has taken 22 years to get a hearing in Israeli courts, yet warrants to demolish homes are issued regularly, and Israeli violence is meted out without impunity or retribution. Even when one member of the community is paralyzed after being shot. His mother also complains that she is refused permission to build a room for his care, and he is forced to live in poor conditions underground in the village’s caves. There is no compensation despite protests for justice and international media attention.

The power and the limits of international pressure

Gregory Townsend discussed the power and the limits of international pressure to ameliorate the situation. The documentary shows how a five-minute visit to the local school by former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair led to a temporary cessation of the demolitions in Masafer Yatta.  He also recalled that on 19 July 2024, the UN General Assembly asked the International Court of Justice at the Peace Palace in The Hague about the legality of the Israeli occupation of Gaza. The Court ruled that under International Law, it is not. In November 2024, the International Criminal Court indicted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for crimes against humanity, issuing an international warrant for his arrest.

Townsend explained that Article 49 of the Geneva Convention on humanitarian law states that an occupying power may not transfer populations to occupied areas. To date, half a million Israeli settlers have relocated to the Palestinian Territories. Likewise, the forcible transfer of Palestinians is also illegal.

Nevertheless, Townsend stated that a future Israeli government will eventually have to evacuate its settlers from occupied territory and will have to ultimately pay reparations according to the illegal actions sanctioned in the United Nations Register of Damage Caused by the Construction of the Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (UNRoD). Both speakers agreed that this can only happen with tremendous public pressure against the occupation.

After explaining the role of international humanitarian law, Townsend added: “What gives me some hope is that this is a Palestinian-Israeli co-production.” But he also pointed out that not a single distributor or streaming service in the US has shown the film despite its Oscar.

Emotions and stories from the audience

The tragic scenes and the violence of the occupation shown in the film generate anger and sadness. These emotions filled also the auditorium where we watched the film. Being an audience of water students and teachers, many of us were particularly disturbed by the scene of the Israeli soldiers destroying first the school and later a water well by filling it with concrete and cutting the pipes. One student shared that the film had triggered memories of her experiences in post-apartheid South Africa. Another told about the US occupation of Iraq. Comments by other students from Turkey and Indonesia added a truly international perspective to the debate.

No Other Land also tells a story of commitment and collaboration between a Palestinian and an Israeli journalist. It is a story about the power of the media but also of its limits in the face of violence, oppression, and widespread violation of human rights and humanitarian law. Screening this film was a small act of solidarity with the victims and those who are suffering in the ongoing war in Gaza and the occupation in the West Bank. The minimum we can do is to keep watching, talking, and denouncing the crimes of the war, inspired by the sensitivity, stubbornness, and commitment of the protagonists of this film.