Synopsis This collection of essays by academics and practitioners from around the world underscores issues and concerns of sustainable urban development and best practices in terms of theory as well as praxes. Contributors have made an attempt to critically reconcile the hypothetical with the applied in order to arrive at innovative solutions for urban good governance in the context of water supply reforms including water management, sanitation, migration of rural population to cities, and women's empowerment in a common project. The papers more often than not transcend regional specifics to address the common agenda of urban development debates as informed by assorted modernization perspectives in the twenty-first century.

This volume brings together social scientists, development consultants and non-profit professionals so that the multipositional theories and multicultural praxes might be reflected in their papers based on empirical research, project studies and field-level insights. It is expected that it will provoke fresh debates and bring new ideas that will facilitate theory-building as well as formulation of paradigms for good practices and sustainable urban applications.

The book will be found highly useful by town planners, municipal administrators, NGOs working in the field of urban development, particularly water supply and sanitation, and common readers interested in urban problems and policies. It will prove equally valuable for policymakers as well as students, researchers and teachers of urban economics, urban sociology, urban geography and public administration.