The Right to Water in the European Union: A Critical Analysis

Clean water has always been an indispensable good to life, human health and dignity, and it is a precondition for survival. Yet, its formal recognition as human right to water has been a recent event. This situation was the result of considering water as freely available as the air to breath. The situation is changing due to water scarcity and water stress problems affecting the overall globe. Many reasons causing this situations can be found. For example, population growth, climate change and the global water consumption patterns are the most known causes. In this way the international society felt the necessity of acting on this vital good. In order to tackle the issue, the international community has started working on water problems from two perspectives. On one hand, there is the environmental law perspective that basically concerns the quality of the water sources, its protection and maintenance. On the other hand, there is the human rights law perspective. Compared to the environmental law perspective, this one can be taken as a new approach that has been introduced to the traditional water law to the end of guaranteeing good quality of drinking water to everyone. To the end of understanding the process of recognition and implementation of the human right to water either at international level or at EU level, this doctoral thesis has been developed as follows: The first chapter will consist on the international dimension of the right to water, the second and the third chapter will focus on the EU water law and its policy, and finally, the fourth chapter will consist on a comparative analysis of the right to water at the international level and at the EU level, taking into account the results obtained in the previous chapters.