New Book Explores Ethical and Religious Implications of a World with Less Water

Water, that most essential building block of life, forms the basis of a new book by Christiana Peppard, Ph.D., assistant professor of theology. 

Just Water: Theology, Ethics, and the Global Water Crisis (Orbis, 2014), was published on January 14. 

Geared toward educated non-specialists and scholars alike, Just Water aims to explore important aspects of the global fresh water crisis while also providing ethical analysis and principled recommendations about fresh water use and scarcity in the twenty-first century. 

The book is part of a research agenda that seeks to challenge traditional norms concerning the value of natural resources. 

“In an era of economic globalization, the default language for speaking about the value of something is its price,” Peppard said in a 2012 interview with Inside Fordham.

“When we talk about worth, as a theologian or philosopher, there’s an enormous apparatus for dealing with that question. But in contemporary parlance, value equals price. This project brings in an ethical perspective in order to broaden the conversation.”

Peppard says the goal of Just Water is to expand global discourse about the value of a fresh unique, and non-substitutable substance that serves as a baseline for human existence . She also hopes to offer tools for understanding and appreciating contemporary ethical problems posed by looming fresh water scarcity in the twenty first century. 

Follow Peppard on Twitter at @profpeppard or via her website.

—Patrick Verel