Water is the most valuable resource and the most passionately contested. Drought has become an increasingly extreme problem in many parts of the world, and it is predicted that 60% of the major cities in Europe will run short of water in the next decade. In industrialized countries per capita water usage continues to rise intractably, despite strenuous efforts by environmentalists and resource managers to encourage conservation. Conflicts over water and environmental degradation from the overuse of resources are intensifying. Water is not merely a physical resource: in every cultural context it is densely encoded with social, spiritual, political and environmental meanings, and these have a powerful effect upon patterns of water use a nd upon the relationships between water users and suppliers. This book makes an in-depth analysis of the meanings of water and considers how they are experienced and formed at an individual and societal level.