The effectiveness of World Bank conditionality in transboundary rivers with special emphasis on Southeast Anatolia Project

Abstract

In the past major emphasis of the World Bank conditionality in transboundary rivers was onlegal requirements. In the 1990s, however, in addition to these requirements the WorldBank began to focus on sustainable development as a conditionality in its lending policy intransboundary rivers. The aim of this thesis was to explore to what degree and in what wayscan the new conditionality be effective in solving the transboundary river disputes.Throughout this thesis the effectiveness of the new conditionality was evaluated with aspecial emphasis on GAP.In the past the conditionality of the World Bank did not work in case of GAP as a result oftwo factors or two pillars of the conditionality. These were the domestic factorshydropowergeneration and irrigation purposes-of Turkey and the design-rigidity andambiguity of the principles-of the World Bank conditionality. In the 1990s, both theWorld Bank conditionality in transboundary rivers and the scope of GAP changed.Evaluating both the World Bank conditionalities and the developments and establishmentsin GAP shows us that there is a compatibility between the World Bank conditionality andGAP in terms of sustainable development. As a result of this, the World Bank began tofinance projects in GAP.However, sustainable development as a conditionality has also its own problems. First it hasvarious definitions. In most of the defmitions the concept of sustainable development isambiguous. The directives and operational guidelines of the World Bank, with theirinflexible and ambiguous design, can also be manipulated by the contending riparians.Moreover, the legal requirements of the World Bank are still valid.So we can say that the new conditionality of the World Bank will not work in case of GAP.The second pillar of conditionality process that is the domestic factors of the recipientcountries-both Turkey's and Iraq's, as well as Syria's political, social, and economicexpectations from the river system-and the third pillar of the conditionality process that isthe design of conditions-the rigidity of the legal considerations and the ambiguity of thesustainable development concept-are the major determinants. of the failure.