Doctoral Dissertation Research: Federal State-Making and Democratic Processes in Nepal

世界上民主国家的数量继续增加。他们中的许多人是以联邦共和国的形式组织起来的，就像美国一样，在联邦政府和通常称为州的各个组成单位的政府之间划分权力。然而，新的民主国家发现，建立这些安排-界定权力和划定单位-可能导致暴力冲突，即使联邦制被推广为一个基础广泛的解决方案，以管理民族领土的内部冲突，加快国家经济发展，并加强民主。这就提出了关于建立联邦制的人的方面的问题。公民如何体验联邦变革？不同族裔和其他从属关系的公民如何在地方一级感到被纳入或被排斥？他们的地方归属感如何影响他们对国家的归属感以及由此产生的民主的质量？这些都是重要的问题，可以帮助我们理解是什么让民主在当今世界发挥作用，是什么让民主在当今世界发挥作用。 为了调查这些问题，耶鲁大学人类学研究生艾米·约翰逊将在Kalyanakrishnan Sivaramakrishnan博士的指导下在尼泊尔进行研究。尼泊尔在十年内战（1996-2006年）结束后，目前正在向联邦政府过渡，这使其成为研究的理想地点。通过研究一个由联邦省组成的系统是如何划分和制度化的，研究解决了关于治理结构、政治参与和民族归属感之间关系的基本问题。为了了解不同的地区和社会经济群体如何参与联邦制度的产生过程，约翰逊将在三个组织层面收集数据：一个多民族的地方社区，该地区最近发生了针对联邦制实施的暴力事件;一个连接地方和国家行政关系的地区;在首都，立法者和国家重组专家正在设计尼泊尔的联邦省份以及相应的行政和法律的政策。在每一个地方，她将采用社会科学方法的组合，包括：民族志参与观察，与多个利益相关者的生活史访谈，和档案研究。从这项研究的结果将提供深入了解联邦安排是如何在独特的文化背景下实现，扩大联邦制的理解超越其理论化作为一个技术金融体系，并朝着更大的了解其人性化的层面，无论联邦制是发现。

The number of democracies in the world continues to increase. Many of them are organized as federal republics, like the U.S., with a division of powers between a federal government and the governments of the individual constituent units, often called states. However, new democracies have found that instituting these arrangements -- defining the powers and delineating the units -- can lead to violent contestation even though federalism is promoted as a broad-based solution to managing ethnic-territorial civil conflicts, expediting national economic development, and enhancing democracy. This raises questions about the human dimensions of instituting federalism. How do citizens experience federal change? How do citizens of different ethnicities and other affiliations come to feel included or excluded at the local level? How do their feelings of local attachment affect their attachment to the nation and the quality of the democracy that results? These are important questions for understanding what makes democracy work or not work in the world today. To investigate these questions, Yale University anthropology graduate student, Amy Johnson, under the supervision of Dr. Kalyanakrishnan Sivaramakrishnan, will undertake research in Nepal. Nepal is currently transitioning to federal governance following the conclusion of a ten-year civil conflict (1996-2006), making it an ideal location for the research. By studying how a system of federal provinces is demarcated and institutionalized as it is taking place, the research addresses fundamental questions about the relationship between structures of governance, political participation, and sentiments of national belonging. To understand how diverse regional and socio-economic groups engage with the process of producing a federal system, Johnson will collect data at three organizational levels: a multi-ethnic local community in a region that has seen recent violence in response to the implementation of federalism; a district that bridges the local and the national administrative relationships; and the capital, where lawmakers and state-restructuring experts are designing Nepal's federal provinces and accompanying administrative and legal policies. In each locale, she will employ a mix of social science methods, including: ethnographic participant observation, life history interviews with multiple stakeholders, and archival research. Findings from this research will offer insight into how federal arrangements are achieved within unique cultural contexts, expanding understanding of federalism beyond its theorization as a technical-financial system and toward greater knowledge of its human dimensions, wherever federalism is found.