University of Minnesota Press Blog

This is what water privatization looks like. 

It looks like Johannesburg, South Africa, where a multinational water corporation moved in and began installing pre-paid water meters in black neighborhoods. “No money, no water,” the head of Aquafed, a coalition of private water corporations, stated. Cholera broke out. Riots ensued. 

Is this what is next for Detroit?

In one of the most segregated cities in America, the predominantly black urban center is suffering, while those in the mostly white suburbs continue taking showers, washing cars, and filling swimming pools. This is an environmental justice issue, a human rights issue, and a national sovereignty issue. Detroit’s water customers may well receive cut-off notices from France in near the future, where the world’s largest water multinationals are based. These companies, Suez and Veolia, are currently in the market for bankrupt American utilities. But the U.S. government says we cannot afford to supply our citizens with clean water anymore. We will try to make the poor pay instead, and possibly pay France. Water rates in Detroit have gone up 119 percent in preparations for privatization.

Finally, the UN has taken notice, stating the U.S. is in violation of international human rights laws by not supplying clean water to the poor. “Sick people have been left without running water and working toilets,” a panel of three experts from the UN Human Rights Office said in a statement issued on June 25. “People recovering from surgery cannot wash and change bandages. Children cannot bathe and parents cannot cook.” UN special rapporteur Leilani Farha said that if the water disconnections disproportionately affect African Americans, “they may be discriminatory, in violation of treaties the U.S. has ratified.”

It is yet to be seen if the U.S. will pay attention to the UN’s scathing review of its water policies. At the very least, the UN has provided an embarrassing commentary on our dwindling status in the world. We have been gutting our water infrastructure budget since the days of Ronald Reagan and now need around one trillion dollars to keep it up and running. Instead, Republicans have consistently pushed for privatization of our water utilities, opposing what the Cato Institute calls “water socialism.” They want water capitalism, it seems.

Meanwhile in Detroit, Mayor Mike Duggan claims there has been “significant misinformation” about the water cut-offs. Things are not so bad, he said. There were only 46,000 water cut-off notices in May, and only 4,531 cut-offs—only 4,531 new toilets that will not flush, babies’ bottoms that cannot be wiped, wounds that cannot be cleaned. He thinks that is not too much. Water and Sewage Department Director Sue McCormick has also tried to allay residents’ fears, stating, “Unpaid Detroit water bills affect only Detroit customers. No suburban customers pay any extra on their bills to make up for unpaid bills on Detroit addresses.” People in the suburbs will be fine, she assures us; they will not be asked to pay more to keep the water running downtown. As for the U.S. government, it may be forced to pay more by the UN. If the U.S. does not correct this violation of human rights law by providing financial assistance to those who cannot pay for water, it faces UN punitive actions and a further lessening of status abroad.

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Karen Piper is the author of The Price of Thirst: Global Water Inequality and the Coming Chaos (Minnesota, October 2014), Cartographic Fictions, and Left in the Dust, which the Los Angeles Times has called an “eco-thriller” that every “tap-turning American” should read. A regular contributor to Places magazine, Piper is also a winner of Sierra’s Nature Writing Award and has published in numerous academic journals. She is professor of postcolonial studies in English and adjunct professor in geography at the University of Missouri.