University Lecture: Is Water 'The New Oil'?: The New Water Monopolies and the World's Poor

The world's water supplies are gradually being bought up by a handful ofmultinational companies, including Suez, Vivendi, and Bechtel.  These companies, in turn, are supported by World Bank policies that force poorer countries to privatize their water supplies. Piper will look at the consequences of water privatization today, sharing her research in India and South Africa and exploring the stark disparity between World Bank rhetoricand conditions on the ground, or what cartographers call "ground truth."Facing either water cut-offs or being flooded out, local people have taken drastic measures to gain access to the media or to simply continue their water supply and survive, including attempted mass drowning, extended fasts, monkey-wrenching, and riots. Piper will look at the way in which these forms of resistance are changing the shape of development discourse today and shedding light on the gap between "development" and "disaster."

Karen Piper is Professor in the Department of English at the University of MIssouri-Columbia.

The Humanities Center is supported in part by a National Endowment for the Humanities Challenge Grant.