Throughout the 1990s, with disputes raging between pro- and anti- dam campaigners, social movements and grassroots campaigners joined forces to stop or delay large dam projects globally. With the mandate of finding a way forward for the benefit of all concerned, the World Commission on Dams (WCD) was born.
Active between 1998 and 2000, the WCD was a global environmental assessments (GEA) body established to resolve conflicts around the planning, construction, and operation of large dams. Despite its short time frame, it was unusually ambitious for a GEA. As well as reviewing the development effectiveness of large dams and assessing alternatives for water resources and energy development, it was also tasked with developing internationally acceptable criteria, guidelines and standards.
The Commission was composed of 12 Commissioners, a Secretariat based in South Africa, and a 68-member Stakeholder Forum. Commissioners were selected from geographically diverse countries of origin, along with the inclusion of women in what was a traditionally male-dominated field. Unusual for its time, these characteristics of WCD foreshadowed GEA institutional design trends to come.
Although the WCD helped pave the way for similar global processes in subsequent decades, making it a step on the road towards today’s more advanced models, the WCD’s use of evidence has received limited attention in the academic literature. To rectify this, Chrsitopher Schultz and William M Adams undertook a study based on the insights from 91 participants in the WCD process.
A convening tool
WCD is considered to be one of the first ‘knowledge platforms for sustainability’, gathering and deploying evidence in the face of conflict early on in the internet age. Descibed as almost being ‘an experiment in multi-stakeholder dialogue and global governance’, WCD advocated for the inclusion of groups such as civil society, academia, government, business – a significant novelty at the time.
Whereas conventional emphasis in GEA processes was on technical and quantitative data, in the WCD, personal engagement with emotionally charged evidence, including that from grassroots sources and participatory processes, helped to create a shared understanding among opposing sides.
In fact, in such a heated debate where opposing sides did not trust each other, calling for evidence was one of few actions both could agree on. Within the WCD the formula that ‘the evidence’ supports ‘the truth’ was powerful in bringing people together. Evidence did not just mediate between conflicting sides; it was an influential convening tool that allowed conversations in the first place.
Schultz and Adams believe the WCD provides insight into the role of emotions in evidence-based policymaking. The authors suggest that emotional engagement and shared experiences can be a catalyst that makes participants in GEAs receptive to evidence, that otherwise might conflict with their entrenched pre-existing views and/or personal or professional interests. Indeed, testimonies by dam affected people were described as both memorable and the most impactful element of the WCD process.
As quoted in their report, a commissioner gave Schultz and Adams insight into an experience that left a lasting impression on Jan Veltrop, former President of the International Commission on Large Dams.
“We were in a village where you could see the reservoir, and this village did not have electricity or irrigation water. And Jan Veltrop asked several questions like, “So … you don’t have any of the benefits from this project?” And it was like, “Nope.” And it was on the bus ride going back, that he … he was quietly crying. And I remember speaking with him, and it was really like: “I’ve been an engineer for 50 years, I’ve worked on these projects, and it’s breaking my heart that 20 years after this dam was built, these communities aren’t getting anything.”
Such emotionally charged evidence created a sense of urgency that may have helped disrupt entrenched policy positions, Schultz and Adams add. Although tensions and negative emotions may have dominated early stages of the evidence-gathering process in the WCD, over time, bonds between the diverse groups of participants in the process were created. Relationships between polar opposites grew and former ‘enemies’ would be seen going through documents together, trying to understand one another’s position, because neither one had really been exposed to the other before.
Whilst the impact of learning new evidence was stronger among those participants that were characterised as ‘pro- dam’, new evidence was taken on board by all participants. One anti-dam activist recalled opposing a dam in the Western Cape but then when there was a recent drought there, they were glad the dam had been built!
Overall, Schultz and Adams say the WCD experience suggests that emotions and shared experience were important dimensions in informing policy recommendations.
Reference
‘…and the evidence was irrefutable’: The politics of evidence in the World Commission on Dams by Christopher Schulz & William M.Adams. Geogr J. 2025;00:e70002. https://doi.org/10.1111/geoj.70002
