Conference: Mexico + H2O = Challenges, Reckonings, and Opportunities

Last year, “Mexico + H2O: Challenges, Reckonings, and Opportunities” brought together policy makers, scholars, and activists to discuss how lack and abundance of water, contaminated and privatized as well as communal, has altered both Mexican cities and rural areas.

In many ways, water is synonymous with Mexican identity — the rise of Tenochtitlan was possible because of the control of water and the Mexican Revolution was as much a battle for land as it was for access to the resource that would water post-revolutionary lands. More recently battles over water on the U.S. – Mexico border are potential previews of how water scarcity might alter relations with our closest ally. But what does water scarcity, restoration, as well as flooding and drought mean in a Mexican context?  

From historians to hydrologists to border analysts and architects, each shared their perspectives and examined how control of water has shaped and will continue to shape the future of the nation, its citizens, and its neighbors.

The conference was presented by the David Rockefeller Latin American Studies Center in collaboration with the Harvard Graduate School of Design and the Department of History of Science.

Panel 1: Who Owns Mexico’s Water?

Enrique Lomnitz, Director, Isla Urbana; Mario Luna, Spokesman for Vícam, Sonora; Human and Indigenous Rights Defender for the Yaqui; Ismael Aguilar Barajas, Professor of Economics, Tecnológico de Monterrey; Antonio Azuela, Professor of Legal Sociology, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
Moderator: Gabriela Soto Laveaga, Professor of the History of Science and Antonio Madero Professor for the Study of Mexico, Harvard University

Panel 2:Water and Urbanization in Mexico

Elizabeth F.S. Roberts, Professor of Anthropology, University of Michigan; Matthew Vitz, Associate Professor of History, University of California, San Diego; Manuel Perló, Researcher, Instituto de Investigaciones Sociales, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México; Luis Zambrano, Researcher, Instituto de Biología, UNAM
Moderator: Lorena Bello Gómez, Lecturer, Harvard Graduate School of Design, Harvard University