The paper addresses the interactions between state intervention and collective action for water quality/quantity management by resource users in European rural areas. Using game theory, we model the incentive structure of different action situations underlying water management issues (social dilemmas, zero-sum games) to specify how the state may intervene to promote collective action. This analytical framework is then applied to five empirical cases across the EU covering diverse action situations. These cases differ in terms of collective action purpose (water management operation; decision-making on projects) and spatial scale (local; regional level) so as to capture diversity in settings. The analysis provides for first insights on the channels used by the state to promote local collective action for water management and a research agenda on the topic.