Undergraduate dissertation example is a lasting bit of drafting and can be the largest challenge which student faces in the midst of acquiring the degree. Finding information, breaking it down, and collecting the materials in a successful way all requires some serious period of time even before the start of writing. Besides, even to form a succinct title sometimes appears to be a very time-consuming task.
The relevance of the topic. Currently, “water problem” is one of the most pressing problems of humanity. A number of factors essential for life, health, and commercial activity of a human is hiding behind this short but capacious concept. There are more than two hundred international river basins which cross the state borders of two or more countries; fifty seven of the ones are located in Africa. However, the preeminent place in this list should be given to the Nile, which is the greatest river of Africa as well as in the world. Its basin covers the territory of ten countries: Egypt, Sudan, Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Burundi, Congo, Eritrea, and Rwanda.
The subject of the dissertation is a historical retrospective of the evolution of water policy of the close-to-Nile states together with internal and external (international) factors influencing its formation. The particular attention is paid to the international legal aspects of regulation of relations arising from the use of the Nile water.
The purpose and the objectives. The purpose of the dissertation contains an analysis of the history of complex issues related to the state regulation and the use of the Nile waters, as well as the formation of conflict-free development in the Nile basin. Based on the above purpose, there are the following specific objectives:
- To conduct a historical analysis of the use of resources of the Nile, its role in socio-economic development of the basin as a whole and in each of its countries individually;
- To explore the modern international legal regime of the waters of the Nile basin; to identify how it meets today’s geopolitical and economic realities in the region of the basin;
- To determine, taking into account the historical experience, the policy priorities of the close-to-Nile states in the field of optimizing the use and allocation of the waters of the Nile among them, and to identify the main difficulties and contradictions in this way;
- To investigate the history and nature of relations between the riparian states in connection with the issue of the Nile waters; to assess the current situation in the area of the Nile basin, the forecast and prospects of interstate cooperation in the field of water resources of the Nile.
The scientific novelty of the dissertation stems from the fact that the author conducted a comprehensive study of the history and the current state of the problem of international legal regulation of the Nile waters for the first time.
The chronological scope of the dissertation is determined by the historiography of the problem of the study and covers the period from the end of the nineteenth century until our days, with a mention of some of the most important events of ancient and modern history. The main attention is paid to the modern stage of the close-to-Nile states policy in regulating the use of the Nile waters.
The methodological basis of the dissertation is the synthesis of the specific-country and the problem-historical approach to the analysis of the chosen theme with the elements of the system analysis.
The source base. The sources in the dissertation can be divided into several groups:
- Official sources;
- Materials of international and non-governmental organizations;
- Works containing analysis of the legal, economic, and environmental problems of the water use;
- Reference books.
The practical significance of the dissertation is that specific historical and country study problems of management and utilization of the Nile waters allows to form a more coherent picture of the current state of affairs in this vast region, as well as to have a clear understanding of water policy of the close-to-Nile states, to propose steps for the possible adjustments in approaches to the regulation of the flow of the Nile, and to promote the regional cooperation.
The structure and the main content of the dissertation. The dissertation consists of three chapters, Introduction, Conclusion, and Appendices.
References
- Arsano, Yacob, and Imeru Tamrat. (2005). Ethiopia and the Eastern Nile Basin. Aquatic Sciences 67.1: 15-27.
- Awulachew, Seleshi Bekele, et al. (2009). A review of hydrology, sediment and water resource use in the Blue Nile Basin. Vol. 131. IWMI.
- Batstone, R. K. (1959). The utilisation of the Nile waters. International and Comparative Law Quarterly 8.03: 523-558.
- Mekonnen, Dereje Zeleke. (2010). The Nile basin cooperative framework agreement negotiations and the adoption of a ‘Water Security’ paradigm: Flight into obscurity or a logical cul-de- sac?. European Journal of International Law 21.2: 421-440.
- Wolf, Aaron T., et al. (2005). Managing water conflict and cooperation. State of the World 2005: redefining global security: 80-95.