This thesis is about peasant and indigenous struggles for water rights in the Ecuadorian Highlands. It is based on the following main research question: How have peasant and indigenous communities developed multi-scalar political agency in water governance to gain and maintain their water access and related rights in the Ecuadorian Highlands since the 1980s? To answer this question, this thesis analyses the histories and relationships between organized water users, water reforms and non-governmental development organisations (NGOs) active in the Ecuadorian irrigation sector.

In the context of Knowledge for Climate programme, an expert pool was requested from Theme 6 (high quality climate projections) to provide data and information to study the future impacts of climate change on the agricultural land-use patterns in the Netherlands. More specifically, a number of questions were posed in regard to: 1) representing and explaining the spatial distribution of different types of farming; and 2) simulating with Land Use Scanner the future developments of agricultural land-use while taking into account effects of climate change and changes in (agricultural) policy.

This is a special edition of a Wageningen University Working Papers in Evolutionary Governance Theory (EGT). EGT offers a new perspective on the way markets, institutions and societies evolve together. It can be of use to anyone interested in market and public sector reform, development, public administration, politics and law. Theoretically, the approach draws on a wide array of sources: institutional & development economics, systems theories, post- structuralism, actor- network theories, discourse theory, planning theory and legal studies.