The 6th World Water Forum (Marseille, France, 12-17 March 2012) showed that the “water crisis” the world community faces today is largely a governance crisis. Securing water for all, especially vulnerable populations, is often not only a question of hydrology and financing, but equally a matter of good governance. Managing water scarcity and water-related risks such as floods or natural disasters requires resilient institutions, collaborative efforts and sound capacity at all levels.

This chapter explores how improving multi-level governance can contribute to effective design and implementation of water policies in LAC countries. It emphasizes the scope, rationale and methodology structuring the analysis in the report. It also highlights the instrumental role of good governance in addressing territorial and institutional fragmentation in the sector and in meeting the Millennium Development Goals.

This chapter outlines the roles and responsibilities of actors in the design, regulation, budget and implementation of water policy, as well as the modalities for allocating roles and responsibilities in the water sector at central government and sub-national level. It offers a preliminary typology of LAC countries based on the institutional organisation of their water sector and it identifies key features and trends within the region in terms of allocating roles and responsibilities. Information was collected from the responses of 13 LAC countries to an OECD questionnaire.

This chapter identifies the main obstacles preventing the design and implementation of integrated and coherent water policies in LAC countries. Taking a close look at the interplay between different public actors involved in water policy making, the chapter diagnoses seven major multi-level governance gaps, based on selected indicators and data collection from the OECD Survey on Water Governance.

This chapter identifies the policy instruments used by governments to bridge multi-level governance gaps considered to be bottlenecks in the co-ordination and implementation of water policy. An in-depth focus on instruments fostering horizontal co-ordination across ministries, horizontal co-ordination across local actors, and vertical co-ordination between levels of government, shows the variety of practices adopted by LAC countries for multi-level co-ordination of water policies and capacity building at sub-national level.