Ríos, Redes y Movimientos Sociales. Una conceptualización de experiencias españolas desde la ecología política

In Spain, as in the rest of the world, an increasing number of rivers are in crisis. In this contribution we present a conceptual framework for understanding rivers through four analytically distinct but closely interwoven conceptual perspectives. These perspectives are: ‘river-as-ecosociety’, ‘river-as-territory’, ‘river-as-subject’; and ‘river-as-movement’. The perspectives are used to analyse five rivers in the Iberian Peninsula where social movements have been able to articulate to defend and transform ‘their eco-social rivers’. These cases are the Rio Grande river in Andalusia, the Dilar and Monachil rivers also in Andalusia, the Júcar river in Valencia and the interconnected Tagus and Segura rivers in the centre of the Iberian Peninsula. The analysis of these five cases through the four conceptual perspectives presented allows us to better understand rivers as intrinsically socio-material entities in constant dispute. Entities that are created and recreated through the intricate interaction between society, infrastructure and the environment. Similarly, this analysis invites us to establish links with the initiatives we have conceptualised as ‘ new water justice movements’, which seek to inspire and support the development of alternative river eco-society imaginaries and to materialise living, socially and environmentally inclusive rivers.