Montpellier Méditerranée metropolis and its hydrosocial territory

Abstract

This article analyses the reconfiguration of the hydrosocial territory of Montpellier Méditerranée Metropolis through its massive connection to the Rhône River, materialised by the inauguration of the Valédeau drinking water treatment plant in 2024. Drawing on a political ecology approach, we examine the political, institutional and technical mechanisms that led to this major transformation of metropolitan water supply. Our research, based on documentary analysis and semi-structured interviews, highlights three main findings. First, this connection is part of a sociotechnical lock-in initiated in the 1960s around the exploitation of the Lez River: rather than a rupture, we observe a "translation" of this lock-in towards an expanded dependence on the Rhône basin. Second, the climate argument undergoes a significant reversal: it is mobilised not to justify limiting water abstraction, but to legitimise more intensive resource exploitation. Third, this reconfiguration consolidates the metropolitan authority's territorial power over peripheral territories. These findings question the capacity of Mediterranean metropolises to genuinely shift towards sustainable water management models, as the hybridisation of technical systems appears less as a transition than as an adaptation of the existing lock-in.