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Introduction -- Constructing the environment in law: making it count -- Environmental water managers: examples of indirect legal personhood for rivers -- Just another user : environmental water managers in Australia -- Partnership as success: the EWMs of the western USA -- Competing narratives and the paradox of the EWMs -- Rivers as legal persons : competition and collaboration -- Legal rights for rivers : a cause for celebration or concern?

In 2017 four rivers in Aotearoa New Zealand, India, and Colombia were given the status of legal persons, and there was a recent attempt to extend these rights to the Colorado River in the USA. Understanding the implications of creating legal rights for rivers is an urgent challenge for both water resource management and environmental law. Giving rivers legal rights means the law can see rivers as legal persons, thus creating new legal rights which can then be enforced. When rivers are legally people, does that encourage collaboration and partnership between humans and rivers, or establish rivers as another competitor for scarce resources? To assess what it means to give rivers legal rights and legal personality, this book examines the form and function of environmental water managers (EWMs). These organisations have legal personality, and have been active in water resource management for over two decades. EWMs operate by acquiring water rights from irrigators in rivers where there is insufficient water to maintain ecological health. EWMs can compete with farmers for access to water, but they can also strengthen collaboration between traditionally divergent users of the aquatic environment, such as environmentalists, recreational fishers, hunters, farmers, and hydropower. This book explores how EWMs use the opportunities created by giving nature legal rights, such as the ability to participate in markets, enter contracts, hold property, and enforce those rights in court. However, examination of the EWMs unearths a crucial and unexpected paradox: giving legal rights to nature may increase its legal power, but in doing so it can weaken community support for protecting the environment in the first place. The book develops a new conceptual framework to identify the multiple constructions of the environment in law, and how these constructions can interact to generate these unexpected outcomes. It explores EWMs in the USA and Australia as examples, and assesses the implications of creating legal rights for rivers for water governance. Lessons from the EWMs, as well as early lessons from the new 'river persons,' show how to use the law to improve river protection and how to begin to mitigate the problems of the paradox.

Food sovereignty is about the right to healthy food and the right to have control over one's food. This article examines opportunities and challenges in the efforts of Feast Down East (FDE), a local food systems movement in Southeastern North Carolina, to develop a food sovereignty program linking limited resource consumers and growers in an effort to provide access to healthy, affordable, and culturally appropriate foods in a low-income community. Several FDE initiatives attempt to address common problems in limited resource communities, such as food insecurity, food access, and knowledge about healthy food preparation. "Fresh markets," which are run by low-income consumers and sell affordable produce, link limited resource farmers to urban, low-income public housing neighborhoods. Nutrition and cooking classes are offered at the market sites, and recipes are distributed at the point of sale. FDE's Food Sovereignty Program also partners with other organizations, such as Food Corps to raise awareness about healthy eating in schools, and two local nonprofits to provide fresh produce boxes to low-income residents. Surveys of 16 program participants conducted by extension leaders indicate increases in food security, healthy eating habits, and physical activity among participants. Semistructured interviews with four community resident leaders illuminate some of the barriers of neighborhood effects and other challenges in cultivating food sovereignty, such as living conditions, politics of place, and broader inequalities. Additional initiatives that address food sovereignty in limited resource communities are needed as a means of expanding access and gaining additional knowledge about challenges in doing so.

Rural regions are often seen as key sources of urban water supply, creating pressure for reallocation and potential hotspots of competition for water between cities and agriculture. How effective and equitable is reallocation from rural to urban regions, and what have we learned from the global experience? This synthesis report examines the drivers, processes, politics, and outcomes of reallocation based on a review of the literature and insights from four in-depth case studies where governments have reallocated relatively large volumes of water from rural to urban regions: Melbourne, Australia; Mokopane, South Africa; Monterrey, Mexico; and São Paulo, Brazil. The findings suggest that water reallocation can play an important role in regional development. However, reallocation projects have also been controversial because of distributional conflicts regarding who wins and loses. The concept of benefit sharing, long applied to transboundary river basin management, offers a framework for designing effective and equitable reallocation processes, shifting the focus from dividing the water to sharing the benefits among rural and urban regions. The report identifies seven key lessons for realizing the potential of reallocation and limiting the risks.

Rural regions are often seen as key sources of urban water supply, creating pressure for reallocation and potential hotspots of competition for water between cities and agriculture. How effective and equitable is reallocation from rural to urban regions, and what have we learned from the global experience? This synthesis report examines the drivers, processes, politics, and outcomes of reallocation based on a review of the literature and insights from four in-depth case studies where governments have reallocated relatively large volumes of water from rural to urban regions: Melbourne, Australia; Mokopane, South Africa; Monterrey, Mexico; and São Paulo, Brazil. The findings suggest that water reallocation can play an important role in regional development. However, reallocation projects have also been controversial because of distributional conflicts regarding who wins and loses. The concept of benefit sharing, long applied to transboundary river basin management, offers a framework for designing effective and equitable reallocation processes, shifting the focus from dividing the water to sharing the benefits among rural and urban regions. The report identifies seven key lessons for realizing the potential of reallocation and limiting the risks.