Social, Economic, and Political Investigations into Transition Strategies and Institutional Trajectories in America's Rural Arctic

这个项目是对阿拉斯加农村地区的社会和经济转型过程、制度轨迹和“发展”意识形态的探索性民族志研究。有关社会和经济发展的各种公共(州、联邦)和私人(企业、非政府组织)干预战略的共性、成功和失败的分析和意见将从相关社会、经济和政治机构的知情和/或关键位置的成员推导出来，这些机构包括：州立法机构、劳工部、商务部、小企业管理局、阿拉斯加大学、德纳利委员会、第一阿拉斯加研究所、阿拉斯加原住民联合会、土著公司、石油公司、阿拉斯加总承包商、社会经济研究所和阿拉斯加国会代表团。这个项目既是探索性的，也是预备性的，试图汇编一系列相互关联的模型，包括1)全州范围内的长期社会和经济进程，2)阿拉斯加机构，特别是土著部落和公司的轨迹，以及3)该州内社会和经济发展意识形态的拓扑结构。数据收集采用一种民族志元分析的形式，其中对参与者的社会、经济、政治和历史分析模型，无论是正式的还是非正式的，都是通过半结构化的访谈来引出的，比较他们之间的相互依赖，然后作为一个整体进行分析。由此产生的州内重要进程的全面模型将提供必要的知识基础，使制定关于阿拉斯加发展的更狭隘、更深入的研究建议成为可能。这项研究产生的元分析模型不仅将为未来的研究提供知识基础，还将为农村社会学和经济变化与发展社会学领域当前的辩论提供信息；农村领导人和社区成员肯定会发现，这项研究的最终结果不仅有助于他们了解自己所在州的社会和经济状况，还将为围绕制定和实施地方和区域政策的辩论提供信息。

This project is an exploratory ethnographic study of social and economic transition processes, institutional trajectories, and ideologies of 'development' in and pertaining to rural Alaska. Analyses and opinions relating to the general characters, successes, and failures of the various public (State, Federal) and private (Corporate, NGO) intervention strategies for the purposes of social and economic development will be deduced from informed and/or critically-positioned members of relevant social, economic, and political institutions, including: State legislature, Dept of Labor, Dept of Commerce, Small Business Administration, University of Alaska, Denali Commission, First Alaskans Institute, Alaska Federation of Natives, Native Corporations, Oil Companies, Alaska General Contractors, Institute for Social and Economic Research, and the Alaska Congressional Delegation. This project is both exploratory and preparatory, seeking to compile a series of interconnected models of 1) long-term statewide social and economic processes 2) the trajectories of Alaskan institutions, particularly native tribes and corporations and 3) the topology of ideologies of social and economic development within the state. Data collection takes the form of a kind of ethnographic meta-analysis, wherein the models of social, economic, political, and historical analysis, both formal and informal, of actors are elicited through semi-structured interviews, compared with an eye to their interdependence, then analyzed as a whole. The resulting comprehensive models of significant processes within the state will provide the necessary foundations of knowledge which enable the formulation of more narrowly targeted, in-depth research proposals concerning development in Alaska. The meta-analytic models generated by this research will serve not only to provide the foundations of knowledge for future research and to inform current debates within the fields of rural sociology and the sociology of economic change and development; rural leaders and community members will surely find that the eventual final product of this research both contributes to their knowledge about social and economic conditions in their state and informs debates surrounding the formulation and implementation of local and regional policy.