Foreign funding-induced development, institutional weakening and access to water: a case study from Kerala, India

Water governance is a multifaceted political and administrative practice across the world. The domestic water management policies of developing societies are subjected to global water politics: institutional change due to foreign aid in Kerala's water governance proves this relationship. Foreign aid has shifted the control of rural drinking water supply from government to the community. The urban sector has shifted its operations from a subsidized to non-subsidized system. These shifts have undermined the institutional access to water and converted water to an economic good rather than a merit good. Thus, accessibility has been shifted to a price mechanism, eventually leading to the exclusion of the poor from an organized pipe water supply system and excluding the state from providing that piped water supply.