Doctoral Dissertation Research: Evaluating Risk and Uncertainty in Urban Infrastructural Planning

大规模的基础设施规划提出，增加对一个国家的基本系统和服务的投资，可能会为其公民带来一个改变的未来。然而，之前对政府投资计划的研究强调，鉴于大规模项目很少能按时或按计划完成，雄心勃勃的国家计划承诺的未来往往遥不可及。因此，对于那些受到复杂计划固有的旷日持久的执行过程影响的人来说，国家规划可能同样是希望的来源，也可能是恐惧的来源。随着投资重建国家基础设施的提议在美国和全球各地的工业化国家越来越受欢迎，迫切需要了解投资于长期、大规模基础设施规划的最终影响。除了为人类学研究生提供严格数据收集和分析的科学方法培训提供资金外，该项目还将使更多的受众参与科学进程，并向投资于优化城市基础设施规划的组织广泛传播其研究结果。哈佛大学博士生考特尼·T·维特金德将在让·科马罗夫博士的建议下，探索在大规模基础设施计划的背景下采用哪些投资、投机和规划策略。将在缅甸文化和经济中心仰光市(原仰光)进行广泛的人种学研究。作为一项令人印象深刻的国家主导计划的所在地，仰光是研究大规模国家主导规划利弊的理想地点。该计划提议将该市扩大2万英亩。研究人员将把重点放在仰光地区的西南部郊区，包括这项城市扩张计划中将重新开发的三个城镇。在那里，她将就大规模基础设施规划的影响提出两组问题。第一组询问生活在仰光地区西南部的人所做的日常决定与他们对城市扩张计划、进展和未来潜力的看法之间的关系。第二组问题以缅甸正在进行的民主过渡中的第一组问题为背景，询问人们对市政和地区规划的印象与他们对国家政治的看法之间的关系。研究人员将通过人种学研究收集数据，包括参与者观察、家庭调查、半结构化和非结构化访谈和档案分析。这项研究的结论将为个人、市政当局和国家层面的规划之间的关系提供新的见解，同时也有助于政策制定者和民间社会组织更好地评估基础设施投资的前景，考虑到其可能存在的风险。这一奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Large-scale infrastructural planning proposes that increased investment in a nation's basic systems and services might bring about a transformed future for its citizenry. Yet, previous research on governmental investment plans stresses that the futures promised by ambitious state-planning often remain out of reach, given that expansive projects are rarely completed on time or as according to plan. Thus, state planning might equally be a source of hope and a source of fear for people impacted by the protracted implementation processes inherent to complex plans. With proposals to invest in the rebuilding of national infrastructure growing in popularity, both in the United States and in industrializing nations across the globe, an understanding of the ultimate effects of investment in long-term, large-scale infrastructure planning is urgently needed. In addition to providing funding for the training of a graduate student in anthropology in scientific methods of rigorous data collection and analysis, the project would engage a wider audience in the scientific process, and broadly disseminate its findings to organizations invested in optimizing urban infrastructural planning. Harvard University doctoral student Courtney T. Wittekind, advised by Dr. Jean Comaroff, will explore what strategies for investment, speculation, and planning are employed in the context of a large-scale infrastructural plan. Extended ethnographic research will be conducted in the city of Yangon (formerly Rangoon), Myanmar's cultural and economic center. As the site for an impressive state-led plan that proposes to expand the city by over 20,000 acres, Yangon is an ideal location for the study of the advantages and disadvantages of large-scale state-led planning. The researcher will focus on the Yangon region's southwestern outskirts, including three townships targeted for redevelopment by this city expansion plan. There, she will ask two sets of questions about the effects of large-scale infrastructural planning. The first set asks about the relationship between everyday decisions made by those living in the Yangon region's southwest, and their perception of the city expansion plan, its progress, and future potential. The second set of questions contextualizes the first within Myanmar's ongoing democratic transition, asking how people's impressions of municipal and regional planning relate to their perceptions of national politics. The researcher will collect data through ethnographic research, including participant observation, household surveys, semi-structured and unstructured interviews, and archival analysis. The conclusions of this research will provide new insights into the relationships between planning occurring at the level of the individual, the municipality, and the nation, while also helping policymakers and civil society organizations better assess the promise of infrastructural investment, in light of its possible risks.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.