Analyzing the Upstream Water Documents in the Third and Fourth Development Plans with an Interdisciplinary Approach (Time Frame: 2000-2009)

Abstract

Water resource management has always played a crucial role in sustaining human life. Wherever water exists, civilization has flourished. Analysis of laws, programs and policies, and guidelines in the field of water is one of the topics that has attracted a lot of attention among humanities experts. The aim of the current research is to analyze the discourse of upstream water documents in the time period (2000-2009), the statistical population in this study consists of eight documents from upstream water resources. The current research follows the discourse analysis methodology using the Laclau and Mouffe approach. The findings demonstrate that the dominant discourse during this period is centered around protective and participatory discourse, which serves as the main theme and focal point of these documents. This discourse manifests itself by contrasting the governmental and non-participatory discourse with the protective and participation-oriented privatization discourse in these documents. The main and floating signifiers such as the discourse of qualitative support for projects and programs versus quantitative growth, the discourse of reducing government control and promoting public participation, the discourse of multi-dimensional approach to water resource management, the discourse of privatization of projects, the discourse of resource management change and decentralization, the discourse of environmental protection, and the discourse of technology advancement and knowledge production all contribute to this discourse.

Keywords

• discourse analysis
• third and fourth development plans
• upstream documents
• water