RC Passage 2 Explanation
Paragraph Summaries
- There are increased international conflicts over water resources. Nations see the need for legal ways to manage their resources, leading to the ILC’s treaty structure for international watercourses use.
- ILC’s Draft Articles attempt to codify customary principles of international water law. They state that one nation’s use of a watercourse shouldn’t harm another nation, and there should be equitable use of waterways, and nations should protect ecosystems.
- The Draft Articles are inadequate to deal with possible future environmental changes, such as atmospheric carbon dioxide’s threat on rivers.
- Treaties like the Draft Articles that allocate fixed amounts of water to nations can’t respond to these changes, and nations have no other mechanisms to deal with reduction in river flow. One solution is more flexible water allocations that allow contingency plans.
Analysis
This passage talks about a problem (international conflicts over water resources) and one way of addressing it: the ILC’s Draft Articles.
Paragraph 2 outlines the Draft Articles’ role: they act as guidelines and say that 1) one nation’s use of watercourse can’t harm another; 2) every nation’s use of the watercourse should be equitable; 3) nations should protect ecosystems.
In paragraph 3, we get some of the author’s opinion. He thinks that the Draft Articles are inadequate to deal with future environmental changes, such as the threat of atmospheric carbon dioxide on international rivers. The effect is that water levels has decreased in these rivers.
The fourth paragraph gives additional detail on how the Draft Articles work: it allocates specific/fixed water rights to nations. These allocations are inflexible so nations have no recourse to the decreased river water levels.
Finally, the author gives one possible solution, which is assigning proportional shares instead of fixed shares, and also incorporate contingency plans to deal with climate changes.
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