Dissertation Research: Researching Present Futures: Neoliberalism, Laboratory Science, and Citizenship in Bolivia

这项NSF科学与技术研究论文改进基金将支持位于玻利维亚拉巴斯的一个特定实验室的人种志实地工作，以检验一个研究实验室对玻利维亚人口的健康和遗传学进行调查与新自由主义、公民身份、身份和民族主义的更广泛趋势之间的关系。这个研究实验室是玻利维亚的实验室之一，在过去的几年里，玻利维亚一直在推动用玻利维亚的材料和人员增加在玻利维亚进行的科学研究。因此，本研究询问为什么科学对有影响力的玻利维亚人变得重要，为什么现在发生这种情况，以及正在进行的特定研究项目发挥了什么作用——这些项目植根于该国的“文化遗产”，这一类别包括玻利维亚人口的遗传物质及其特定属性，例如适应在极高海拔地区的长期居住——在玻利维亚科研基础设施和研究议程的发展中发挥了重要作用。这些调查专门利用玻利维亚材料作为其研究对象，参与实验室研究的人员利用例如针对玻利维亚实验室的具体条件量身定制的实验室规程进行实验。此外，关于发展中国家科学研究增长的民族志研究相对缺乏，也需要进一步调查新自由主义经济政策如何影响国家认同的观念，而这种观念反过来又塑造了具体的政治议程。因此，本项目将解决尚未被广泛研究的问题和过程，同时借鉴并为科学研究和人类学文献做出贡献，因为调查的主题和方法。这项研究将阐明一个国家的科学基础设施是如何发展的，以及指导这一发展的研究议程如何反映和响应全球趋势；在这种情况下，国家资源的私有化。它还将展示生物学，特别是人类生物学，是如何被各种利益集团用来证明关于公民身份、国家身份和身份的某些主张是合理的。因此，这个项目不仅仅是玻利维亚的民族志，也不仅仅是对实验室实践及其认识论的集中研究，因为它将讨论在整个发展中国家以日益尖锐，有时甚至是暴力的方式面临的问题。此外，该项目将探讨如何将科学研究纳入一个国家的框架，并开始阐明人类生物学在全世界国家研究议程中日益重要的作用。此外，如上所述，它将同时为几个文学机构做出贡献，同时解决以前研究不足的社会生活领域。

This NSF Science and Technology Studies Dissertation Improvement Grant, will support ethnographic field work at a specific laboratory located in La Paz, Bolivia, in order to examine how a research laboratory conducting investigations into the health and genetics of Bolivian populations is related to broader trends of neo-liberalism, citizenship, identity, and nationalism. This research laboratory is one of the laboratories in Bolivia that has been involved in the recent push over the past several years to increase scientific research conducted in Bolivia with Bolivian materials and personnel. This study thus asks why science has become important to influential Bolivians, why this is happening now, and what role the particular research projects being conducted -- which are rooted in the "cultural patrimony" of the country, a category that includes the genetic materials of Bolivian human populations and their specific attributes, such as adaptation to long-term residence at extremely high altitude -- have in the development of a Bolivian scientific research infrastructure and research agenda. These investigations draw upon specifically Bolivian materials for their objects of study, and the personnel involved in laboratory research conduct experiments utilizing, for instance, laboratory protocols tailored to the specific conditions of Bolivian laboratories. Furthermore, there is a relative lack of ethnographic studies on the growth of scientific research in developing countries, as well as a need for further investigation into how neo-liberal economic policies influence ideas of national identity that in turn shape specific political agendas. Therefore, this project will address issues and processes that have not been extensively studied, while drawing upon and making a contribution to both the science studies and anthropological literature due to the subject matter and methods of investigation. This research will illuminate how a national science infrastructure is developed, and how the research agendas guiding this development reflect and respond to global trends; in this case, the privatization of national resources. It will also show how biology, particularly human biology, is being used to justify certain claims about citizenship, nationhood, and identity by various interest groups. This project is thus more than an ethnography of Bolivia or a focused study of laboratory practices and their epistemologies, for it will speak to issues that are being confronted in increasingly strident, sometimes violent, ways throughout the developing world. In addition, this project will address how scientific research can figure into the framework of a nation and begin elucidating the increasingly privileged role that human biology has in national research agendas throughout the world. Furthermore, as discussed above, it will contribute to several bodies of literature simultaneously, while addressing a previously under-studied area of social life.