This document discusses changes in the balance of power in the Nile Basin, including the addition of South Sudan as a new riparian state, new infrastructure projects like the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, and Ethiopia taking a more assertive stance in developing the Nile's waters. It argues that upstream states are gaining bargaining power and challenging the historical status quo dominated by Egypt. There is a possibility that the Cooperative Framework Agreement, if ratified, could establish a new framework for cooperation over the Nile's waters.

1. Counter-hydro-hegemony in the Nile Basin:
tipping the balance of power in favour of
upstream riparian states
Presentation to HH6 Workshop
London, 12 January 2013
Ana Elisa Cascão, SIWI

2. Nile Basin: Geopolitical changes since HH5
• New map
• New riparian (South Sudan)
• Political volte-face
State of the Nile River Basin 2012 (NBI)
• Redefinition of regional political
& economic landscape
• New infrastructure projects
• Change of balance of power
• New cooperation paradigms?

3. Changes in the Balance of Power
PAST
PRESENT

4. Bargaining and Ideational Power:
what has changed?
• Negotiations capacity
• Power to set the
’Less’ power asymmetries
agenda/timing
• Collective bargaining power
• New geopolitical actors and Counter-hegemonic actions
settings
• New ’joker’ cards (e.g. GRD)
• New paradigm of Challenges to status quo
cooperation

5. Multilateral Cooperation: the good and the evil
Basin-wide
Multilateral development of
Cooperation transboundary
water resources
Basin-wide legal and institutional framework?
New paradigms for development of water resources?
Agenda-setting: who calls the shots?

6. Cooperative Framework Agreement (CFA):
A new hydropolitical set-up on the Nile?
1997-2007: Multilateral negotiations
2007-2010: Interlude
2010: Signature of the new CFA
> 2013: Ratification by upstream riparians
A not-all inclusive Nile Basin Commission?

7. Grand Renaissance Dam:
a new paradigm for cooperation?
• Multilateral cooperation has not
delivered
• Increasing needs and demands
• Ethiopian unilateral move
• Trilateral Committee
• New paradigm for cooperation?

8. Cooperation without donors?
• Who calls the shots?
• Cooperation outside the NBI
(although...)
• Country-driven
• Trilateral talks
• Investment-driven
• No external funding

9. Outcomes of transboundary cooperation
Ideational
Bargaining status quo
Multilateral Conflict deadlock
Cooperation
avoidance
Ideational
Creative change
Bilateral/Trilateral
Conflict bargaining
Cooperation
addressed

10. Conclusions
How do we know that soft power is being utilised?
How does it have an impact on water resources management
practices and allocation outcome?
How can we assess it as being a form of justice being argued?