Urban water and the politics of citizenship: The case of the Mexico City Metropolitan Area during the 1980s and 1990s

Abstract

The author focuses on the interrelations between access to urban water services and citizenship rights, taking the case of Mexico City Metropolitan Area as the empirical reference. Recent research has shown that social struggles over the access to and improvement of water services have been an important component of Mexican public life during at least the last twenty years. The author argues that mainstream explanations of the water crises tend to reduce the problem to its economic, technological, and physical-natural dimensions. Although the relevance of these factors affecting the provision of efficient and universal water and sanitation service is recognized the emphasis is placed on the socioeconomic and political inequalities that determine the exclusion of large sectors of the population from full access to essential living conditions, including water services.