Uncharted Waters: A Hemispheric Dialogue on Water As a Social Work Priority

Background and Purpose

Water, increasingly, is a pressing concern for environmental researchers across disciplines. Whether addressing the increasing severity of floods and rainstorms (Chakraborty, 2019; Tate et al., 2021), water access and scarcity (Cantillana & Iniesta-Arandia, 2022; Rawlins, 2019), or questions of water use (Obringer et al., 2022; Santos et al., 2023), issues of water continue to come to the fore. However, addressing water continues to be undertheorized and understudied in social work practice and research (Bexell et al., 2019; Mason et al., 2017). This roundtable aims to address this gap by exploring how social workers can work to resolve water issues and by demonstrating social work’s relevance to addressing escalating water crises across North America.

Content and Structure

Three speakers will lead a discussion for this roundtable, each of which will bring a different perspective on water issues. The first speaker will draw from work on an ethnography that examines the ongoing water crisis in an urban center in southern Mexico. This will lead to a discussion of how water scarcity is produced even in areas where water is greatly available, examining the impact of market-based mechanisms and local policy on water access. Presenters will discuss how water scarcity is socially caused not only in Mexico, but in urban centers in the United States as well. The second speaker will draw from a spatial analysis of K-12 school district exposure to extreme flooding and tornado events across the U.S. Midwest. She will provide an analysis of how exposure to such events correlates with specific demographic, socioeconomic, and policy indicators. In doing so, presenters will discuss how social workers can better prepare and support school communities in the context of water-related disasters. The third speaker will discuss a water justice framework examining the impact of Artificial Intelligence data centers on local communities. By looking at how data centers impact water use in water-stressed areas across the American Southwest, speakers will discuss the need to consider data centers as an environmental justice issue. This will lead to a broader discussion as well about the impact of growing AI integration.

Conclusion

Collectively, these speakers are engaged in research across North America, enabling a hemispheric discussion on water as a social work issue. Additionally, by drawing from a wide range of methodological expertise to studying water, the discussion will cover different strategies social work researchers can take to address proliferating water crises.

Following a lively discussion, we will engage attendees in a conversation on cross-cutting themes including the importance of utilizing environmental justice frameworks; environmental considerations for social work practice even in areas which seem disconnected from issues of water; various ways social workers can address water issues in different practice domains; challenges in addressing water as a social work community; and linking broader social forces to ongoing water crises. Attendees will be encouraged to share their own experiences with water issues and to reflect on how their research and practice has connection to water.