The Cultural Dynamics in Water Management from Ancient History to the Present Age

Book excerpt: The Cultural Dynamics in Water Management from Ancient History to the Present Age focuses on exploring the idea of water culture and how water culture has been generated from water management and social life. It discusses the structure, attribute, type, and the dynamic mechanism of water culture theoretically. It also deals with its diversity and practice in water management with cases from twelve countries, geographically covering most continents of the world. This book is divided into five main sections which include the theoretical discussion of water culture, the historical water culture, the water culture and water management in indigenous societies, the cultural role in local water management, the water cultural practice in the present age using the case of water museum, etc. It is based on a historical and geographical approach to exploring the cultural dynamics in water management. It shows how people abide by their culture to manage water in ancient society and in indigenous, local, social, and urban society. This helps to provide an in-depth understanding of the cultural dynamics in water management to bridge the cultural idea of water management from history to the present and to the future. This book highlights that technical and engineered ways are not enough to solve water problems and achieve water sustainable management if we neglect the cultural dynamic role. Successful water management is always based on the culture from history and this is likely to continue so as to achieve better water management.