Making Sense of “Day Zero”: Slow Catastrophes, Anthropocene Futures, and the Story of Cape Town’s Water Crisis
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The paper deals with an interesting topic, namely the theme of water and drought, from a social point of view, inserted in the context of the geological era of the Anthropocene. The author underlines that the problem of drought is a problem of slow catastrophe which concerns social, economic, political, cultural, institutional aspects and cannot therefore be considered a "natural" disaster (please correct the expression on line 194 and see "Power, Prestige & Forgotten Values: A Disaster Studies Manifesto" available online). The presented case study represents a very effective Anthropocene scenario. It represents a case of regional geography that could be realized on a global scale, if we did not take the necessary precautions, which depend above all on the behavior of the human beings and more and more in the future from the aspects of cultural geography and from the relationship between culture and nature. The author should only integrate the bibliography with more recent references to the Anthropocene and disasters (see Antronico et al.,2019 and literature by David Alexander and Ilan Kelman, which highlights the social aspects of disasters). The author would also strengthen the personal reflections with references already published on the area that concerns the case study. Furthermore, the author should clarify the methodology used by creating a section in the paper. For me the paper is accepted with fewer revisions.Author Response
Many thanks for your comments, which are most useful. I have tried to incorporate the changes that you suggest, berating in mind the comments of the other reviewers.
Reviewer 2 Report
The article Making sense of "Day Zero": Slow catastrophes, Anthropocene futures, and the story of Cape Town's water read as an interesting perspective. This paper discussed:
slow catastrophes as a way in to understanding that future water research will increasingly need to account for social, cultural, political (etc.) systems issues
as such, redefining water not as a commodity, but as a complex object off natural-cultural-social heritage
framing of Cape Town as an ideal microcosm to leap into what we might expect from future water scenarios, both in terms of human issues and in terms of natural extreme events
the general importance of individual behaviour change
more implicitly, ideas around what I recognise as power asymmetries, community dynamics, social capital, and psychological distance (e.g. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvp.2015.10.003)
the need to move past a positivist/empiricist approach to water research, and for 'new metaphors, new metrics, new disciplines, new forms of analysis, a whole new language, to describe these new realities'
I wholly embrace these concepts as needing deeper consideration by those working in more 'traditional' water research, and I am intrigued by the use of Cape Town as exemplifying a natural-social-technical 'testing ground' for the future. However, many of these underlying concepts are not novel contributions to the academic literature in and of themselves, without any guidance as to how to grapple with them in water research. For example, the idea of 'slow catastrophes' has taken the form of 'chronic stresses' or 'stressors' in resilience literature e.g. Rockefeller Foundation (http://www.100resilientcities.org/faq/), Collier et al. (https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cities.2013.03.010), etc. In general, the importance of considering natural resources and infrastructures as intersecting with socio-cultural aspects is becoming more recognised in sustainability, resilience, social-ecological systems, socio-hydrology, and other bodies of literature which draw heavily from complex systems theories. Thus, something further around one or more of these research areas would be needed for this paper to constitute an original contribution that advances current knowledge, e.g. a well-defined and actionable set of recommendations for water researchers, a new framework for understanding slow catastrophes and how to examine them, explaining Cape Town case study by framing it through an existing social-ecological theory, research results from a specific experiment, etc.
The narrative style was refreshing, however this was not explicitly acknowledged or justified as a departure in style from a typical Water research article.
Thus in terms of both content and style, this paper would be more suited to (1) a magazine or blog. Perhaps it would also be suitable (in a more rigorously developed form) as (2) a perspective/discusson-style piece in another journal. The author might even consider building on the core concepts within the existing paper and designing experiments based on them for (3) a full research article.
If resubmitting elsewhere as a discussion paper, I would recommend beginning with the 'story' of Day Zero (an abbreviated version of sections 2 through 6) as a backdrop of traditional drought understanding, followed by future research needs or directions regarding how to improve that traditional understanding (a fleshed out and thoroughly referenced version of section 7). More careful tying of introductory issues with closing remarks/recommendations would be needed (e.g. the two further ideas borrowed from Nixon regarding attention deficits and disproportionate impacts were never revisited in the concluding section). References also need reexamination in general. Of the 105 items in the reference list, 38 of these were repeated citations (leaving an actual total of 67). More concerning than this formatting oversight was that 34 of the remaining 67 were online news articles, and a further 8 were written by the submitting author. A more widely-cast net and a deeper dive into the academic literature would have strengthened the paper and organised some of the concepts more clearly.
If resubmitting as a full traditional research article, the prevalence of news articles suggests that perhaps a media content analysis, and a comparison to narratives told by those who were 'on the ground' at the time in Cape Town (examined through research surveys/interviews) might be a suitable direction. Another direction might be to explore what is suggested in parts of section 7, which is Cape Town's history of social activism as an essential success factor behind changing behaviour at a faster and more consistent rate compared to similar droughts in different locations. Deeper, more specific investigation of these meatier socio-cultural dynamics that are behind reduced water use (and other sustainable behaviours) would be welcomed.
Overall, there is something meaningful for Water readers fighting to get out of these ideas, but it is not entirely clear what that message is, or more importantly how it advances knowledge, in its current form.
Author Response
Many thanks for your comments, which are most useful. I have tried to incorporate the changes that you suggest, berating in mind the comments of the other reviewers.
Reviewer 3 Report
This is a very interesting article that 'investigates' the Cape Town 'day zero' problem faced by the city in 2017/18.
It is a well written piece of research that would benefit through from:
significant improvement in the referencing style in line with the guidelines of the journal. At present it is a tiresome way of referencing and needs to be improved.
the paper is well written, but could be shorter and more focused and suggest it is reduced in length by 50 lines of text.
it also misses, completely, existing research on the political economy of water, which is what the article clearly demonstrates. This is a well researched area, and so could benefit from being strengthened with solid references on the political economy of water and these types of challenge conflicts over access, and use, and hydrology, engineering, politics, and decision making. Many of the issues raised are not particularly new in water research, but they are presented in an interesting way and add value as a piece of research looking at the political economy dynamic during this period in Cape Town - it is certainly an interesting read.
Lines 471-483 - the simplicity of the issues here need to be spelled out clearer - awareness, education, empowerment, have helped citizens solve water challenges as city residents. The potential changing nature of citizens and the State and the utility here need to be made clearer, especially in relation to the capping of the spring by the utility (lines 560 approx) in relation to the law, human right to water, etc. this is a key issue that seems to be overlooked.
The author would benefit into looking at political economy research, and also taking into account the 'cost' and 'crisis' response mode of Government to issues, in particular, slow onset issues such as drought.
Author Response
Many thanks for your comments, which are most useful. I have tried to incorporate the changes that you suggest, berating in mind the comments of the other reviewers.
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
The previous review included the following: "something further around one or more of these research areas would be needed for this paper to constitute an original contribution that advances current knowledge, e.g. a well-defined and actionable set of recommendations for water researchers, a new framework for understanding slow catastrophes and how to examine them, explaining Cape Town case study by framing it through an existing social-ecological theory, research results from a specific experiment, etc."
I appreciate the effort to cite wider literature, of which there were a handful of examples from the reviewers in round 1. However the author has not performed the deeper revisions to the paper that reflect how it is contextualised in the existing knowledge base, and that provide a substantial advancement of current knowledge (as above). I would continue to recommend this as a blog, discussion paper, news commentary, book chapter, etc. but do not believe it warrants publication in an academic journal in its current form.
Author Response
Please see my response to the academic editor.
