(D)River of Change? The local implementation of the EU Water Framework Directive in Germany

Related to issues such as the global climate change, growing populations, and industrial pollution, the world is experiencing a decrease of quality and quantity of freshwater resources with tremendous impact on the well-being of people, as well as future social and economic development. As a result, appropriate governance approaches that integrate the complexities surrounding the issue of water management are needed to protect contemporary water resources and prevent any further deterioration. Through the introduction of the European Union Water Framework Directive (EC/60/2000), the European Union (EU) and its member states have aimed at tackling these issues by introducing a wide range of policy obligations to the European member states, including, but not limited to, a specific focus on public consultation during the process of planning and implementing measures to improve the general quality of European waters, thus making public participation a central element of water protection in the EU. However, being based on the local contexts at hand, approaches to public participatory processes may be argued to be highly diverse, making it difficult to understand the functionality in terms of contributing effectively to the aims of the directive. Therefore, the thesis is informed by the question of “how we may identify local and regional differences in approaches to active public participation in the context of common policy-objectives?”, leading to the sub-question of “how can we understand those differences in the context of the Water Framework Directive in Germany?”. The thesis answers these questions via the application of a Qualitative Comparative Analysis to two cases in Germany. The analysis shows strong differences in the implementation of participatory processes in the context of the WFD across both cases, as well as insufficiencies, for instance when it comes to adjusting the participatory process to the local and regional needs.