Brazil, which holds 12% of the world’s drinking water and faces international pressure to exploit and manage this resource for the world market, is experimenting with new forms of participatory decision making. How are decision-making dynamics operating in this new context and how are they influencing the differentiation of access to and control over water resources in Brazil? In the last ten years, water has become part of the international political agenda because of its expressive unequal distribution in the world, due to its uneven natural occurrence and more importantly the uneven access to this resource. In this context, new approaches for water management have been developed such as in Brazil. Implemented since 2000, the new policy is based on an integrative, decentralized and participatory approach in which watershed committees comprised of representatives from state, civil society and private sectors were founded and are the deliberative institutions aimed at water management. The purpose of my research project is to understand the main strategies used by committee members to empower their participation at the watershed committee level. Their alliances and networks at different scales of decision, are the main focus of my analysis.