conference paper · European Conference on Knowledge Management
Water management in Morocco's Ourika Valley faces challenges stemming from the neglect of traditional knowledge in contemporary policy. Moving from community-based oversight to state-directed groundwater contracts has sidelined the deep, site-specific understanding held by local populations. An investigation using Nonaka's SECI model alongside a survey of 55 stakeholders reveals a persistent divide between explicit state regulations and tacit community wisdom. Centralised, top-down rules frequently conflict with local customary practices, undermining the social legitimacy of official water projects. By contrast, ancestral management mechanisms successfully regulate resource scarcity through shared communal and ethical norms. Achieving long-term water security requires policy frameworks to bridge this epistemic division. By serving as an intermediary, public governance can combine traditional practices with modern technical standards, turning formal water contracts into collaborative agreements that blend technological precision with established indigenous resource management.
Top-down environmental regulations often fail when they ignore centuries of local resource management. Demonstrating how indigenous practices effectively handle water scarcity provides a template for policymakers to design more legitimate and resilient governance models. Bridging technical administrative rules with local ecological knowledge offers a practical pathway for resolving resource conflicts in vulnerable mountain ecosystems.
The findings primarily inform public sector governance, policy design, and community co-management frameworks rather than direct commercial products. Potential applications include developing co-designed water contracts and participatory management tools for regional water agencies and environmental consultancies. Because the research is focused on qualitative policy analysis and knowledge framework modelling, it remains at an early conceptual stage, requiring institutional adaptation before implementation in formal regulatory settings.
AI-generated from the published abstract. Always read the original work before citing.
This paper explores the relationship between ancestral water knowledge and contemporary policy in Morocco’s Ourika Valley, positing that the current crisis is fundamentally one of epistemic neglect. By examining the transition from community-based management to state-imposed groundwater contracts, the study investigates how modern instruments often devalue the tacit cognitive capital and indigenous knowledge of local populations.Utilizing a qualitative methodology that combines Nonaka’s SECI model with a survey of 55 stakeholders, the research analyzes the failure to integrate "tacit knowledge"—the deep, site-specific understanding of mountain ecosystems—into official policy. The analysis reveals a profound disconnect between the "explicit knowledge" utilized by state agencies and the "tacit knowledge" practiced by communities. Results indicate that top-down regulation frequently clashes with customary law, diminishing the social legitimacy of state projects, whereas traditional systems effectively manage scarcity through shared ethical constraints. The paper concludes that a sustainable future requires knowledge hybridization. Rather than substituting technology for tradition, the state must act as a mediator, integrating the precision of ancestral methods into formal legal frameworks. The study advocates for rethinking the water contract, transforming it from a top-down directive into a co-created platform that synthesizes modern technological rigor with the enduring wisdom of indigenous water management.
This page summarises published work. The authoritative version sits with the publisher.
DOI: 10.34190/eckm.27.1.5186
Is something wrong with this record? Report it or request removal.
Discussion
Have you built on this work, tried to replicate it, or seen it applied in practice? Share what you know. Verified researchers and MARATTO™ domain experts can open a discussion, and any member can reply. Contributions are reviewed before they appear.
No discussion yet. Open the first thread.
New to MARATTO™? Create a free account.
