Water and Politics in Africa

     For most of us, our first thought about water in Africa is that Africa lacks water. Images of deserts and arid lands cracked by drought come to mind. But is this preconception really true? A member of the steering committee of the African Water Association (AAE), Claude Jamati edited the collective work entitled L'Afrique et l'eau (2014) and refutes this well by stating that "Africa does not lack water but distribution and sanitation infrastructures." Similarly, Mohamed El-Azizi, director of water and sanitation at the African Development Bank, makes the same observation: "Africa has plenty of water but no water to drink" ( Heuclin & Hewitt, 2015 ).      The real challenge linked to water is therefore its unequal distribution, which compromises the economic development of certain territories, as its presence is a guarantee of growth and essential to the majority of economic activities. Let's take the example of the great variability of rain...

       Hi!      My first post aims to introduce you to a little bit of who I am and why I chose the theme “Water and Politics”. I am an affiliate student at UCL in the Economics department and my home university is Sciences Po Paris so the thematic choice was obvious. During my first two years at Sciences Po, I studied in the Europe-Africa program on the Reims campus and started learning Swahili! I am therefore particularly curious to learn more about the issue of water in the East African region and I am very interested in this course which intersects all my interests by analyzing the African continent under the prism of development! During my second year at Sciences Po, Benjamin Marx's course "Economics of Development" was my first introduction to understanding the specific economic challenges of developing countries, revealing to me the full extent of the continent's potential for growth and influence.      The theme "Water and Po...