Citation

Jacobs I. Afr. Secur. 2010; 3(1): 21-45.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2010, Informa - Taylor and Francis Group)

DOI

10.1080/19362201003608789

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

As a result of the water security dilemma in southern Africa and the relative scarcity of the resource in the region, several scholars have referred to southern Africa as a hydropolitical complex. Using a constructivist ontology, this paper attempts to illustrate the hydropolitical complex's strengths and weaknesses in both helping and hindering an understanding of transboundary water resources by emphasising that while state-centric and/or system level analyses may lend themselves to basin-wide cooperative strategies due to the manner in which water is prioritised as a strategic resource within a river basin and beyond a basin, it displays a limited utility in explaining subnational configurations. Using South Africa as a case study, and thereby opening up the black box of the region's most powerful state, the hydropolitical complex unveils its numerous weaknesses.