A Systematic Review of the Existing Literature to Evaluate What is Already Known of the Participatory Irrigation Management

The Participatory irrigation Management (PIM) introduced in the 1970s provided for a decentralised and citizenry based irrigation with multi-actor involvement. Though welcomed and applied globally with great enthusiasm, the true impact of PIM still remains obscure. This work tries to demystify this obscurity to identify the nature of evidence and impact as reported by the works on PIM since 1980s. A systematic review of 51 works has been made from Asia, Africa and the Americas to understand both the spatial and temporal pattern of the works. The study finds the works were spatially biased towards Asia and Africa and the major part of the review was based in the decade 2010–2020. The quality of data of the reporting works was mainly based on secondary evidences and on smaller sample sizes. The study found the failure of the government as the major reason backing the rise of PIM and various internal and external factors were affecting its functioning. About 60% of the studies have used the water related outcomes for impact analysis. The study finds that the impact as reported by the papers has been mixed with 30% of the total works claiming the outcome to be a positive one while 45% reporting it as negative or negligible. The study hints at the weakness of the preceding works in attaining consensus on the methods and impacts of PIM. The works also fail to bring out the ‘human’ part of the practice where the socio-psychological aspects of the actors have remained grossly underrated and unreported.