The Backup Plan: Visualizing Disappearing Groundwater Resources on the US-Mexico Border

The absence of groundwater treaties is a global trend despite the fact that groundwater crosses the majority of international boundaries. Why have property rights over groundwater failed to evolve from the national level to the international level? Given the broad scope of the question, this thesis narrows its geographic focus and asks: What explains the absence of a groundwater treaty for the US-Mexico border?

Visibility is the obvious difference between groundwater and other resources such as surface water which are regulated by treaties. As a result, current research on groundwater treaties assumes the role of visibility and moves on to look at other issues such as institutional dynamics.1 This is a mistake. This thesis argues that visibility does not play the traditional role it is assumed to have. Its customary role is one that creates ambiguity. For example, negotiators cannot act due to underground data gaps.

This reveals a critical misunderstanding. These explanations look at groundwater as a singular resource rather than through its relationship with surface water. Within the larger system, groundwater is the dependable resource – it is the backup plan. It lets people know that even in times of a drought they will have water. Groundwater serves as the lack of ambiguity. It lowers the perception of scarcity and with it incentives to manage use.

To test this argument, this thesis tracks three periods of rapid change in the visibility of groundwater and the reaction in the Mexicali and Imperial Valleys. These three periods are: the completion of the lining of the All American Canal in April 2010, the 7.2 Sierra El Mayor Cucapah Earthquake in April 2010, and Minute 319 in November 2012. Interviews and written accounts provide an understanding of how visibility, specifically its rate of change, impacted bilateral action on groundwater.

This thesis looks not only at the perception of groundwater’s dependability, but also at what will happen when it is no longer dependable. An analysis of n-level datasets on surface water conflict and cooperation illuminates the role of groundwater in reducing conflict and the implications of its absence.

These findings provide a novel understanding of the roadblocks to a groundwater treaty, and the implications of inaction.