Lyla Mehta is a Professor at the Institute of Development Studies, UK, and a Visiting Professor at Noragric, Norwegian University of Life Sciences.
She trained as a sociologist (University of Vienna) and has a Ph.d. in Development Studies (University of Sussex).
She uses the case of water and sanitation to focus on the politics of scarcity, marginality, intersectionality, privatization, rights and access to resources, resource grabbing, power and policy processes.
Her work also focusses on displacement and resistance as well as climate change, uncertainty and transformation.
She has extensive research and field experience in India and southern Africa.
Lyla has engaged in advisory work with various UN agencies and has also been active in advocacy and activist work on environment and development issues with NGOs and social movements in Europe and India.
She is currently editor of the journal Environment and Planning E, Nature and Space and on the advisory board of the journal Water Alternatives.
She was team leader of the UN High Level Panel of Experts on Food Security and Nutrition (HLPE) on Water and Food Security (2014–2015) and is Lead and Contributing Author, IPBES Assessment on Transformative Change (2022–present).
«Water and sanitation are basic human rights. Yet the rights of poor and marginalised people around the world are routinely violated by powerful state and private actors with impunity. I support the Blue Community Initiative’s call for water justice for all, and the need to ensure accountability and that water remains a public good, not a commodity.»
Selected recent books include:
Mehta, L., Adam, H.N. and Srivastava, S (eds). 2022. The Politics of Climate Change and Uncertainty in India, Oxon: Routledge.
Mehta, L., Oweis, T., Ringler, C., Schreiner, B. and Varghese, S.) Water for Food Security, Nutrition and Social Justice, Oxon: Routledge.
Mehta, L., Derman, B. and Manzungu, E. (eds) 2017. Flows and practices. The politics of Integrated Water Resources Management in southern and eastern Africa, Harare: Weaver Press.
Special issue: Flows and practices: The politics of Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) in southern Africa. Guest Editors: Lyla Mehta, Bill Derman and Emmanuel Manzungu