Community and participation in water resources management: gendering and naturing development debates from Bangladesh

Community and participation have become popular in development discourse and practice, particularly in the global South and in relation to water resources management. Greater involvement of people in decisionmaking, implementation and evaluation of water management practices is expected to increase efficiency and equity in water projects. However, scholars have pointed out that such discourses are often problematically used and idealised, leading to the exacerbation of gender, class and other social differentiations. Drawing from a case study of drinking water contamination by arsenic in Bangladesh, this article examines the mobilisation and outcomes of participation and community in water provision and arsenic mitigation. Water hardship, conflicts and marginalisations are found to be products of social processes (that are gendered, classed and spatialised)…