山陝地區是中國歷史上發展水利灌溉最早的地區之一，圍繞灌溉而形成的管理系統以維護水權為核心，成為重要的民間組織形式。本文在全面分析這一地區水資源管理方式的同時，指出以渠長為核心的基層管理體系、以水程、水序為本的資源控制原則與以「夫「為單位的經濟攤派形式構成近代山陝地區水利管理的基本原則，並在此基礎上提出水權的維護包融了鄉村社會的諸多層面，其中鄉紳、大戶結成具有渠長人選資格的水權控制圈在水利管理中起着重要作用。

Shanxi and Shaanxi provinces, made up of arid and semiarid areas, are one of those regions where irrigation originated and developed earliest in Chinese history. Because of a lack of water resources, the irrigation management system, centering on water right maintenance, became an important mode of organizing civil groups. This research fully analyzes how water resource was managed in this region. It points out that there are three fundamental components of local water and irrigation management: management system at primary level which took managers of ditches as the core, rules of resource control which based on both distance and order and economic apportionment which took ＂Fu (an individual who meets certain standards)＂ as a unit. Furthermore, this paper elucidates that the maintenance of water right involves various aspects of rural society. The group of people who were eligible to be ditch-managers constituted the power circle of water right and played significant roles in water and irrigation management.