This article inquires into the meaning of a 'right' to water. It examines how the nature and content of such a right may be changing in the context of greater emphasis in environmental regulation on water stewardship which seeks to tackle risks of water scarcity. In the UK, for instance, water abstractions have been further regulated through the Water Act 2003 and additional reforms are proposed by the draft Water Bill HC (2013-4). The article locates its analysis in literature on the qualification of private property rights through natural resource management, and in the developing socio-legal literature on the intersection between rights and regulation. We critically engage with this literature on the basis of qualitative empirical research about how farmers in England think about a right to water. Our pilot project confirms some accounts in the literature, but questions others. We find empirical support for thinking about rights that is qualified by stewardship practices, but we suggest that conceptions of rights need to be broadened to include administrative concepts, including collective rights to water. On the basis of our data we develop an eco-socio-legal perspective that foregrounds three interpretive frames for understanding how conceptions of rights to water are generated. These are the institutional-legal framework of abstraction licensing in England and Wales, perceptions of the natural space which is governed by this legal framework, and, the economic context in which rights to water are exercised.

This policy brief addresses how the meaning and scope of farmers' economic rights to access and use water are changing through increasing emphasis on stewardship responsibilities. It outlines how regulation is increasingly seeking closer alignment of water use and stewardship by injecting public interest considerations into the legal interpretation of water rights. This has the potential to enhance the public accountability of private right holders. Market-based water resource management in England and Wales is currently being considered by the UK government as one option for further promoting water stewardship. The policy brief highlights key issues discussed during a workshop held in Oxford on 19 March 2013 that addressed the question whether it is still meaningful to talk of an economic 'right' to water in the context of increasing restrictions on water use in England and Wales. The policy brief concludes with a series of recommendations. An appropriate legal and institutional framework for delivering an integrated catchment approach must be developed in order to align water use with water stewardship. Farmers, as managers of extensive land areas, need to be part of this. Lastly, integrated catchment management needs to entail clear standards of performance for water users in order to align water use with water stewardship.

Regulatory reforms of water abstraction licensing underway in England seem to place a greater emphasis on water stewardship as a means to incorporate a wider public interest into farmers' use of water for agricultural production. This article explores different meanings of water stewardship and its potential for guiding reforms. In doing so it also draws on the findings of a pilot research project carried out in 2012, funded by the British Academy.