Access to water for all in France, or the erratic trajectory of a subsidiary problem (1984-2016)
Studying the trajectory of the problem of access to water for all in France between 1984 and 2016, this paper aims to show how the issue of access to water for low-income households has slowly become dominant for the French political agenda since the 1980s. This problem, firstly considered minor and whose treatment was judged complex, jointly evolved with the problems of access to energy and housing in a context of precarisation and institutionalization of public policies against poverty. The problem later gained autonomy, driven by the international and national recognition of the right to water and demands for its effective implementation. Throughout this trajectory, two kinds of approaches have been developed to deal with consumers’ difficulties to pay their bills, leading from welfare of water to social water, meaning an evolution from a treatment of the problem by social welfare to an internalisation in water utilities.