Towards water regionalism? Examining the linkages between water, infrastructures, and regionalism in Turkey

Abstract

Moving beyond the purely material understanding of infrastruc-tures, new perspectives in infrastructural regionalism assert thatinfrastructures and regions simultaneously shape each other.Drawing on this reciprocal relationship, we introduce the conceptof ‘water regionalism’ to examine how regional factors, dynamics,and complexities shape water infrastructures, and how water infra-structures concurrently shape regions. Through qualitative researchmethodologies, we empirically demonstrate how this conceptoperates in practice by examining the history of regional planningand hydraulic infrastructure development in Turkey, particularly theprocess of how the South-eastern Anatolia Project (GAP) and theGAP region have shaped each other since the 1970s