Book Review: Thirst: Fighting the Corporate Theft of Water by Alan Snitnow, Deborah Kaufman, with Michael Fox
Here in the pluvial climes of the Northwest, we take water for granted. Seattleites obtain their water by way of Seattle Public Utilities, a publicly-owned and managed company committed to conservation, health, and safety. However, water is rapidly becoming a big business and global corporations and their subsidiaries are making gargantuan efforts to turn the world’s supply of fresh water into a profitable commodity. The maximization of profit will trump health and environmental concerns. In this unprecedented era of climate change, we ignore infringement on this fundamental resource at our collective peril.
In their crisp, readable book, Thirst, the authors provide a superb overview of how this corporate campaign—featuring giants like Nestle, Veolia, Suez Lyonnaise, and RWE—is currently being played out in various cities and towns throughout America. “Water is fast becoming a commodity to be bought and sold, rather than a medium through which a community maintains its identity and asserts its values. But for most people in the United States water is still just water—not the stuff of profit or politics. We don’t give it a second thought until the tap runs dry or brown or we flush and it doesn’t go away.”
It may surprise you to learn that the Urban Water Council, which is affiliated with the U.S. Conference of Mayors, is funded and supported by private businesses, thus making the Conference “an engine of water privatization.” Many cash-strapped municipalities can become easy targets as savvy businessmen dangle promises of savings and efficiency before government officials unnerved by the cost of mandated upgrades and maintenance. Once the door is open to such business enterprise, unforeseen problems frequently and sometimes rapidly emerge: Water service and safety become secondary to the primary corporate requirement of making a buck.
However, this book is also replete with stories of the heroic efforts made by common citizens in Stockton, Cal; Lexington, Kent.; Holyoke, Mass.; and elsewhere in this country, who have stood up to corporate arrogance and fought to keep their community’s water in public hands. In some cases, after grueling and frustrating battles against considerable odds, they have won.
Thirst details the power and influence of organized businesses and their relentless and ruthless pursuit of profits. This admirable book also demonstrates the considerable power inherent in ordinary citizens who come together, educate and organize themselves, and build community and democracy in the face of forces whose defining principle is monetary gain.
In conclusion, the authors state: “Whether clean and safe water will remain accessible to all, affordable and sustainable into the future, depends on all of us. The stakes could not be higher. The outcome will surely be a measure of our democracy in the 21st century.” The stories they relate and the exigent message that is repeatedly sounded in each instance of grassroots rebellion make Thirst a book worthy of wide readership.
Thirst: Fighting the Corporate Theft of Water By Alan Snitnow, Deborah Kaufman, with Michael Fox, Jossey Bass, 2007, Hardcover, 287 pages, $27.95