Doctoral Dissertation Research: Assembling Community Economies

世界各地有大量关于社区经济、合作社和社会企业等其他经济组织形式的实证文件，但关于它们的出现、使它们或多或少取得成功的因素以及它们在地方一级推广和扩大的前景，仍有许多有待了解的地方。这项研究将考察在传统的生产、消费、分配和营销形式容易长期不稳定的背景下，社区经济是如何形成和变得或多或少可持续的。预计该项目将通过揭示将这些企业凝聚在一起的日常关系、它们成功和弹性所需的资源、它们面临的限制和挑战以及影响它们稳定性的过程，来推动经济地理学和发展研究中的理论和概念。其结果将为政策制定者、规划者和学者确定干预点；特别是那些希望建立、维持和加强旨在改善弱势社区福祉和韧性的计划的人。该项目的调查结果将在学术机构发表，通过大众媒体来源分发，并在当地和国际会议和研讨会上介绍。在整个项目中，无论是在实地研究期间，还是在研究成果的制定和传播过程中，当地的信息提供人都将发挥核心作用。该项目还将在支持博士生培养方面发挥重要作用。本研究利用一个新的概念框架，借鉴了社区经济、集聚理论和参与者网络理论的各种文献，回答了三组问题：1)参与者之间的差异如何影响社区经济的发展以及社区经济运行所通过的日常生产、营销、分配和其他实践？2)资源和约束如何影响这些实践以及参与社区经济的参与者之间的关系？3)是什么促使参与者参与社区经济，以及哪些因素和过程有助于社区经济的稳定或弹性？这项研究将研究土耳其东部和东南部的社区经济，该地区长期面临社会经济困难，并将研究三项社区经济倡议：工人合作社、消费者合作社和社区品牌倡议。该项目将设在土耳其东部一个以库尔德人为主的城市，在那里将对三个案例进行比较分析。将通过访谈、焦点小组和直接观察收集数据，然后进行定性分析。

There is extensive empirical documentation about community economies alternative forms of economic organization such as cooperatives and social enterprises worldwide, but much remains to be learned about their emergence, the factors that make them more or less successful, and the prospects for them to be extended and scaled up from the local level. This research will examine how community economies come into being and become more or less sustainable in contexts where conventional forms of production, consumption, distribution, and marketing are prone to chronic destabilization. The project is expected to advance theories and concepts in economic geography and development studies by revealing the everyday relations that hold these enterprises together, the resources necessary for their success and resilience, the constraints and challenges facing them, and the processes that affect their stability. Its results will identify points of intervention for policy-makers, planners, and scholars; particularly those hoping to establish, sustain, and strengthen programs that seek to improve the well being and resilience of disadvantaged communities. The project's findings will be published in academic outlets, distributed through popular media sources, and presented in local and international conferences and workshops. Local informants will play a central role throughout the project, both during the field research and in the development and dissemination of research findings. The project will also be significant in supporting the training of the doctoral student. This study utilizes a novel conceptual framework that draws on the diverse literatures on community economies, assemblage theory, and actor-network theory to answer three sets of questions: 1) How do differences between actors affect the development of a community economy and the everyday production, marketing, distribution, and other practices through which it functions? 2) How do resources and constraints affect these practices and the relations among the actors participating in community economies? 3) What makes actors participate in a community economy and what factors and processes contribute to its stabilization or resilience? This study will examine community economies in east and southeast Turkey, a region that has faced long-standing socioeconomic hardships and will study three community economy initiatives; a worker cooperative, a consumer cooperative, and a community branding initiative. The project will be situated in a predominantly Kurdish city in eastern Turkey, where a comparative analysis of three case studies will be conducted. Data will be collected through interviews, focus groups, and direct observations, and then analyzed qualitatively.