DISSERTATION RESEARCH: The Social Consequences of the Lesotho Highlands Water Project

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One of the five largest development projects currently under construction in the world today, the Lesotho Highlands water Project (LHWP) in Southern Africa has a major impact on the lives of people affected by the project. This dissertation research by a cultural anthropologist from the University of California-Irvine will study the effects of the project in Lesotho through the lens of gender relations. The differential impact (usually negative) of development projects on women has given rise to studies in the various traditions of "Women in Development", "Women and Development" and "Gender and Development". These glosses describe different approaches to understanding and examining women's significance in society and in development. Employing a feminist political ecology approach, the student will conduct multi-site ethnographic research involving three dam sites at different stages of construction and implementation (resettled, impacted, and non impacted), with two waves of structured surveys and semi-structured interviews to examine the ways project-affected populations are experiencing development. Gender, class, age, and other socio-economic and socio-cultural categories will be examined to investigate the social consequences of the LHWP on communities and households. The new knowledge to be created will be valuable to development planners as well as to students of river basin projects and of southern Africa. In addition the project helps to train a young social scientist.