On the complex causal relationship of barriers to sustainable urban water management: a fuzzy multi-criteria analysis

A few studies on urban water management have engaged in identifying Sustainable Urban Water Management (SUWM) barriers. Most of these studies proposed many strategies to address them. However, for a developing country like the Philippines, it is impractical to employ all of them at once, especially when resources are scarce. Furthermore, due to the system complexity, conventional analysis, which approaches SUWM barriers in isolation, may not be sufficient. With an end goal of developing leverage strategies based on the causal relationship of SUWM barriers, integration of the Fuzzy Decision-Making and Trial Evaluation Laboratory (FDEMATEL), and Fuzzy C-means Algorithm (FCA) is proposed. The approach was employed to identify the critical SUWM barriers among a set of SUWM barriers based on their causal relationship. Critical SUWM barriers were identified. Insights and proposals for addressing the critical SUWM barriers were proposed herewith to guide urban water managers.