The political risks of technological determinism in rural water supply: A case study from Bihar, India

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dc.contributor.authorHutchings, Paul
dc.contributor.authorParker, Alison
dc.contributor.authorJeffrey, Paul
dc.date.accessioned2016-09-01T14:09:57Z
dc.date.available2016-09-01T14:09:57Z
dc.date.issued2016-04-19
dc.description.abstractWith the politics of the environment so fundamental to the development process in rural India, this paper analyses the relations between water discourses and drinking water technology. First, the national discourses of water are analysed using key policy and populist documents. Second, the paper presents ethnographic fieldwork studying the politics of drinking water in rural Bihar, where the relative merits of borehole handpumps and open wells are contested. The links between the national discourses and local contestation over appropriate technology are examined. The paper argues both policy and traditionalist perspectives are too technologically deterministic to adequately account for the myriad challenges of delivering rural water supply. The emphasis on technology, rather than service levels, creates the conditions in which capability traps emerge in terms of service provision. This is not only in terms of monitoring regimes but in the very practices of rural actors who use certain water supply technologies under an illusion of safety. With a focus on furthering the policy debate, the paper considers ways forward and suggests that a move from a binary understanding of access to a holistic measure of service levels will reduce the potential for political contestation and capability traps in rural water supply.en_UK
dc.identifier.citationPaul Hutchings, Alison Parker, Paul Jeffrey, The political risks of technological determinism in rural water supply: A case study from Bihar, India, Journal of Rural Studies, Volume 45, June 2016, Pages 252-259en_UK
dc.identifier.cris15072992
dc.identifier.issn0743-0167
dc.identifier.urihttp://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jrurstud.2016.03.016.
dc.identifier.urihttp://dspace.lib.cranfield.ac.uk/handle/1826/10479
dc.language.isoenen_UK
dc.publisherElsevieren_UK
dc.rightsAttribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
dc.rights
dc.rights.urihttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
dc.subjectRural water supplyen_UK
dc.subjectPolicyen_UK
dc.subjectTechnologyen_UK
dc.subjectDiscourseen_UK
dc.subjectInsitutionsen_UK
dc.subjectIndiaen_UK
dc.titleThe political risks of technological determinism in rural water supply: A case study from Bihar, Indiaen_UK
dc.typeArticleen_UK

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