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On Wednesday, 28 May, Nicola Harvey will defend her dissertation entitled 'Coordinating the Water, Energy and Food Nexus Through Law'. The interdependencies between the use and availability of water, energy and food resources call for the adaptation of existing governance frameworks, such that trade-offs may be managed and synergies exploited. This research investigates the role of the law in enabling and constraining vertical and horizontal policy coordination across the water, energy and food nexus. From a case study of Cape Town, South Africa, lessons are drawn to better understand the characteristics of an enabling regulatory environment. 

The growing global population and increase in demand for water, energy and food resources in the face of climate change-induced scarcity, presents the occurrence of interlinked food shortages, water scarcity, and insufficient energy resources as increasingly probable in the future. New ways of thinking and flexible forms of resource governance are urgently required to address these challenges. In particular, a greater understanding and consideration of interdependencies and interlinkages across water, energy and food policy domains is required.

The contemporary approach of constructing water, energy, and food as a nexus has been strongly promoted as a global research agenda and emerging development paradigm. At the core of nexus thinking is the recognition that water, energy and food resources are interlinked in a web of complex interactions in which use and availability are interdependent. The way of thinking encouraged by the nexus reinvigorates the call for the adaptation of existing governance frameworks to better reflect and respond to intersectoral interdependencies such that trade-offs may be managed and synergies exploited. The assumption is that this will lead to better management of these resources, mitigating the negative impacts of water, energy and food insecurity. Increased scholarly and policy attention notwithstanding, the water, energy and food nexus is not a clearly defined construct, nor a tested and accepted framework. It remains an emerging agenda that encounters significant conceptual and practical challenges.

This research investigates existing conceptualisations of the water, energy and food nexus, particularly in relation to its application to water, energy, and food policy domains, to identify its underlying utility. Based on a construction of the water, energy and food nexus as a lens through which intersectoral interdependencies can be considered and prioritised in decision-making, the investigation advances to consider the implication of nexus thinking for law. In particular, this dissertation investigates the factors requiring reflection within the law to enable vertical and horizontal coordination across the water, energy and food nexus. This entails positioning law within the broader institutional context shaping political decision-making across water, energy and food policy domains to understand what role the law plays in enabling and constraining coordination.

Through organisational, doctrinal and empirical analyses of existing coordination processes in the case study site of Cape Town, South Africa, lessons are drawn from the successes and failures such that an understanding is constructed of the nature and content of an enabling regulatory environment. Recommendations are then made for those factors requiring reflection within the regulatory design to better support coordination across the water, energy and food nexus.