Cooperation be damned : A study on water relations in The Nile River Basin

Abstract: The Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam built on the Nile has sparked conflicts for over twelve years now since it was first announced in 2009. But in 2020 when Ethiopia finally started to fill this behemoth of a dam hostilities ramped up between Egypt and Ethiopia. Because around 95% of Egypt's freshwater comes from the Nile and this dam is positioned upstreams of Egypt's vital water source. As such, Egypt did not take lightly to Ethiopia's challenge towards their historical water hegemony and responded with threats of violence and war. To further complicate this situation Egyp is facing an acute water shortage in 2025 and climate change will throw a wrench into the whole situation as droughts and floods will become more frequent as the world grows warmer. The empirical work of this thesis used a process-tracing approach to identify that realistic fears are driving Egypt to react with aggression and seek conflicts. However, Egypt's goal is to achieve cooperation and create a water-sharing agreement with Ethiopia. The problem is that Ethiopia does not want to give up their dam control and is satisfied with the status quo, while Egypt is striving to create a situation where they both have something to gain from cooperation. Be it through threatening to invade Ethiopia and blow the dam up or through their use of international institutions to force Ethiopia into cooperation. In the end, the conflict continues as no cooperation agreement has been signed.