Environmental Security and the Role of River Regimes in Fostering (Environmental) Cooperation: Case of the International Sava River Basin Commission

Abstract

This paper examines the potential and extent to which international river regimes can serve as a platform for encouraging basin wide environmental cooperation sustainable river basin management and in doing so complement regional stability. Contemporary literature indicates that river water resources are particularly volatile; as such they serve as sources of social instability and posses the power to promote regional stability by strengthening political and fostering environmental cooperation. The research complementing this paper was part of the Master’s dissertation written by the author under the title — “Comparative Approach to Environmental Cooperative Assessment of River Regimes and the Case of the International Sava River Basin Commission.” The results obtained from analyzing four cases of river conflicts — conflicts on the Rhine, Danube, Nile and Jordan Rivers — indicate that even though river conflicts are complex and basin specific, the development of a relationship between stability and river regimes is possible. Accepting such a relationship, the analysis focuses on the recently established International Sava River Basin Commission and more so because the river was under a single jurisdiction for more than half of a century. It questions the regimes credibility to successfully act as a basin-wide administrational and institutional unit, one which practices sustainable water management, without acting as an environmental protection authority and promoting environmental cooperation under the principles of transparency and stakeholder involvement.