Water Wars: Drought, Flood, Folly and the Politics of Thirst (Hardcover)

by Diane Raines Ward (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Review
Water Wars is a brisk and personable introduction to a once and future struggle that is not going away. -- Stephen J. Pyne, author of How the Canyon Became Grand

A solidly researched, eminently accessible book on the world's water situation...Should be required reading. -- The Los Angeles Times

An engaging story...[with] plenty to inspire and alarm. -- Business Week

Balancing what doesn't work against what does, so we can see past a potentially fatal problem... you should read it. -- New York Times Book Review

Calm, even-handed primer on the challenges in distributing water fairly and the foolhardiness in expecting technology to solve water shortages. -- Free Press, November 27, 2002

Focuses...on how one nation's or community's water use affects another's ability to provide for its own development. -- The Washington Post, November 11, 2002

Riveting...a powerful wake-up call. -- Civil Engineering, February, 2003

Splendid...thoughtful...informative. -- Environment News

Ward's engaging book provides a comprehensive look at international hydropolitics. -- The Baltimore Sun, August 11, 2002

Product Description
"This is a wonderful book, a wake-up call of startling clarity and insight, with a flood of facts and anecdotes that place the abstract into riveting human perspective. I will never turn on the rap again without thinking about where water comes from and where it goes." (Ken Burns, producer and director of the Civil War, Baseball, and Jazz documentaries.)

The story of water is complex, with roots as deep as civilization itself, but what we hear about it today is simple and stark: the world's supply is in severe crisis. Even when we're not confronted with alarming news of another drought, we're reminded of environmental changes and a growing world population that threaten to turn water into a matter over which wars will be fought. Despite these urgent warnings, how many of us can say we understand the elemental forces that brought us to such a precarious state, or what we might do to get out of it?

Taking us on a world tour of the most hotly contested water climates, and introducing us to some of the most passionate advocates to emerge from them, Diane Raines Ward gives us a compelling account of where we've come from, and where we need to go. Why is the Fertile Crescent, historically one of the most lush places on earth, fast becoming a region of scarcity? What do Dutch watermen, steeped in their centuries-old, folkloric battle to protect their coasts, know about rising seas that we don't? Why are certain environmentalists so eager to dismantle thousands of years' worth of engineered solutions to distributing water? And how is it that the very technology vilified by conservationists may be the only thing that can save us? Through a narrative that's breathtakingly clear and filled with fresh insight, Ward answers these and other paradoxical questions, and gives us a bold perspective on a subject to which our fate is inextricably bound.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 368 pages
• Publisher: Riverhead Hardcover; 1st edition (August 1, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1573222291
• ISBN-13: 978-1573222297
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6.3 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,220,769 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars An easy read, but has flaws, January 8, 2003

By	Howdy Pierce (Boulder, CO USA) - See all my reviews

Ward takes a comprehensive and world-wide view of the problem of managing water, and I learned a considerable amount from her book. She writes with an easy style. (Another reviewer calls it "the best book on water that I've read"; that's true for me, too, but in my case it's faint praise since I've only read this book!) Clearly, water management is becoming more important as the world's population grows, and given the public policy decisions facing most nations, it is a subject that the average citizen will need to learn more about. Unfortunately, the book has a couple of flaws. First, it is shallow technically, even for a popular non-fiction book; Ward could benefit by providing additional depth on both the technology of watershed management and the dominant legal structures behind it. Second, I found the footnotes to be very poorly written; frequently direct quotes appear without footnotes, and on many occasions the information in a footnote is almost a non-sequitur when compared to the footnoted text.

7 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The best book on water I've read, September 26, 2002

By A Customer

This is a terrific book-passionate, informed, wide-ranging, and filled with lots of quotes and anecdotes. And it's very personal-Ms. Ward isn't writing from an armchair-she's been to all the places she writes about, and it shows. She's got a great sense of drama and eye for detail-you're right there with her in the helicopter when she flies low over a network of rivers. And because she knows the subject so well, Ms. Ward places all the twists and turns in her fascinating story in a broad, historical context. I'll never look at a glass of water in quite the same way again.

5.0 out of 5 stars Superb Book, April 1, 2009

By	Tim H. (Maine) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Water Wars: Drought, Flood, Folly And The Politics Of Thirst (Paperback)

This is a deeply researched and beautifully written book - an essential volume on an immensely important subject. Recent news events prompted my rereading. Since the original copy was on loan, I purchased and recommend the handsome paperback edition. Do not delay buying and reading this compelling book!