Shifting Governance – Merging Communities? Explaining New Modes of Water Protection in the German Agricultural Sector

Agricultural activities affect water and soil resources and biodiversity in manifold ways (Schaub 2019, Möck et al. 2019). Conflicts over land use and the exploitation and pollution of common pool resources are even intensifying with the increasing share of renewable energies. Water, energy, and agricultural policy are hence characterized by complex interdependencies that are, however, in many cases not reflected in policymaking. The separation of policy fields and the competing goals of subsystem actors present a major challenge to the sustainable management (Villamayor-Tomas et al. 2015). Whereas prior studies have addressed nexus challenges for cases of overfertilization and other water pollutants (Kastens and Newig 2007, Möck et al. 2019, Metz and Leifeld 2017, Ingold et al. 2016, Vogeler et al. 2019) our knowledge on how modes of governance evolve over time and what factors influence the likelihood of cooperation vis-àvis competition between the subsystems is limited. We put forward the argument that a promising approach to explore these dynamics over time is the method of discourse network analysis (Leifeld 2016). By conducting a longitudinal discourse network analysis of German water and agricultural policy in a region with intensive livestock farming and large surpluses of manure posing a risk for water quality, we analyse the development of governance strategies within and among the policy subsystems. Ingold, Karin, Manuel Fischer, Cheryl de Boer, and Peter P. Molinga. 2016. "Water management across borders, scales and sectors: recent developments and future challenges in water policy analysis." Environmental Policy and Governance 26 (4):223-228. Kastens, Britta, and Jens Newig. 2007. "The Water Framework Directive and Agricultural Nitrate Pollution: Will Great Expectations in Brussels be Dashed in Lower Saxony?" European Environment 17(4):231-246. Leifeld, Philip. 2016. Policy Debates as Dynamic Networks. German Pension Politics and Privatization Discourse. Frankfurt/New York: Campus. Metz, Florence, and Philip Leifeld. 2017. "Governing Water with Market-Based Instruments: Preferences and Skepticism in Switzerland." In A Critical Approach to International Water Management Trends. Palgrave Studies in Water Governance: Policy and Practice, edited by Christian Bréthaut and Rémi Schweizer, 147-176. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Möck, Malte, Colette S. Vogeler, Nils C. Bandelow, and Boris Schröder. 2019. "Layering Action Situations to Integrate Spatial Scales, Resource Linkages, and Change over Time: The Case of Groundwater Management in Agricultural Hubs in Germany." Policy Studies Journal online first. Schaub, Simon. 2019. "Salient to Whom? The Positioning of German Political Parties on Agricultural Pollutants in Water Bodies." Water 11 (11):2278. Villamayor-Tomas, Sergio, Philipp Grundmann, Graham Epstein, Tom Evans, and Christian Kimmich. 2015. "The Water-Energy-Food Security Nexus through the Lenses of the Value Chain an the Institutional Analysis and Development Frameworks." Water Alternatives 8 (1):735-755. Vogeler, Colette S., Malte Möck, Nils C. Bandelow, and Boris Schröder. 2019. "Livestock Farming at the Expense of Water Resources? The Water–Energy–Food Nexus in Regions with Intensive Livestock Farming." Water 11 (11).