Counter Streams: Organizing the Dakar 2022 Alternative World Water Forum

ABSTRACT

On the one hand, the most violent expressions of global capitalism can be seen in the acts of depriving the most marginalized populations of water, whether through corporate control or structural reforms imposed by international financial institutions on debt-ridden governments. [...]despite claims that the WWF is open to all, its registration fee of 450 euros is unaffordable to most ordinary citizens, especially those most adversely impacted by water shortages, pollution, and lack of access. The Blue Planet Project, Public Services International, Africans Rising, Engineering Without Borders Spain, African Ecofeminist Collective, African Water Commons Collective, Ecumenical Water Justice Network of the World Council of Churches, Corporate Accountability and Public Participation Africa, Platform for Community Partnerships of the Americas (PAPC), the Interamerican Water Justice Network (REDVIDA), and the European Water Movement. [...]we organized multiple decentralised meetings, webinars on regional water struggles and solidarities connecting communities of struggle and issues including feminist political economy and ecology, water privatization, water financialisation (water went onto the stock market in California in 2021), and water-related impacts of Covid. While there have been waves of regional water mobilization (and demobilization) across the continent, there was no readymade African coalition working on water justice issues when the World Water Council announced its 9th Forum in Dakar.