Water Management: Challenge and Opportunity

Abstract

Water management is multidimensional. It embraces planning, design, construction, operation, and maintenance. Its ingredients include technological capability, social attitudes, economic realities, political viewpoints, and environmental goals. Being able to effectively manage water resources often depends more on our ability to maneuver Within institutional constraints than to design technological fixes. Our engineering capability is more advanced than its application, yesterday's methods are being applied to tomorrow's problems, and regional problems are begging for solutions because we try to solve them on a local scale. The need for institutional reform is clear, but the key to accomplishing it is elusive. Both resource‐related and institutional factors must be considered. Accordingly, potential avenues for reform are presented in that context. The challenge is to face today's and tomorrow's problems with tools appropriate to the times and to the special features of the locality being served.