CAREER: Moral Economies in Water Markets: Implications for Understanding Human Responses to Water Insecurity

到2040年，世界上一半的人口将生活在缺水的条件下。为了管理水的不安全，许多社区将越来越需要依赖移动的、适应性强的和分散的水基础设施，如私人售水机，而不是仅仅依靠集中化的公共系统。在接下来的几年里，至关重要的是要了解如何设计以市场为基础的基础设施，以维护当地关于水正义的观念，并促进享有水的人权。这一职业项目将审查社区何时以及如何动员以市场为基础的道德经济，以他们认为公平和公正的方式管理水不安全问题。道德经济是规范性的经济制度，在这些制度中，共同的正义观念要求个人有义务提供获得重要资源的途径。虽然科学家已将基于互惠的道德经济记录为人类对资源不安全的关键反应，但我们对人们何时以及如何使用基于市场的道德经济安排来管理当代资本主义背景下的水不安全状况知之甚少。在该项目的第一阶段，研究人员将对美国一个主要的水不安全热点地区的私人售水机进行人种学研究，以了解是否以及何时会出现以市场为基础的道德经济。在第二阶段，研究人员将通过对六个全球地点的基于市场的道德经济的跨文化研究(通过与国家科学基金会资助的家庭水不安全研究协调网络的合作)来探索这些发现的普遍性。这两个阶段的研究都将侧重于三个水市场(非正式交换、半正式的水运输和正式的水零售商店)，以考察市场形式如何促进或制约水的道德经济。在每个市场中，研究人员将研究社会距离，即强、弱或缺乏的二元社会联系，是如何为水启用或限制道德经济的。这项研究的结果将有助于从人类学角度了解市场的社会基础；进一步了解人类如何应对以市场为基础的经济中的资源不安全问题；推进关于家庭用水不安全的多尺度原因、后果和反应的跨学科学术研究。该项目的资金还将支持开发一种新的研究学徒模式，将研究的所有阶段与研究生和本科教学相结合，以培训新一代社会科学家，使其掌握基于团队的跨学科社会科学和基于社区的研究方法。该奖项反映了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。

Half of the world’s population will live in water-stressed conditions by 2040. To manage water insecurity, many communities will increasingly need to rely on mobile, adaptable, and decentralized water infrastructures, such as private water vending, rather than on centralized public systems alone. In the coming years then, it will be crucial to understand how market-based infrastructures can be designed to uphold local notions of water justice and advance the Human Right to Water. This CAREER project will examine when and how communities mobilize market-based moral economies to manage water insecurity in ways they consider to be fair and just. Moral economies are normative economic institutions in which shared notions of justice obligate individuals to provide access to vital resources. While scientists have documented reciprocity-based moral economies as a key human response to resource insecurity, we have little understanding of when and how people may use market-based moral economic arrangements to manage water insecure conditions within contemporary capitalist contexts. In Phase 1 of the project, the researcher will ethnographically examine private water vending in a major U.S. water insecurity hotspot to understand if and when market-based moral economies for water arise. In Phase 2, the researcher will explore the generalizability of these findings through a cross-cultural study of market-based moral economies in six global sites (via collaboration with the NSF-funded Household Water Insecurity Research Coordination Network). Both phases of research will focus on three water markets (informal exchanges, semi-formal water hauling, and formal water retail stores) to examine how market formality enables or constrains moral economies for water. Within each market, the researcher will examine how social distance, dyadic social ties that are strong, weak, or absent, enables or constrains moral economies for water. Findings from this research will: contribute to anthropological knowledge of the social foundations of markets; further understand how humans respond to resource insecurity in market-based economies; advance interdisciplinary scholarship on the multi-scalar causes, consequences, and responses to household water insecurity. Funding for the project will also support the development of a novel research apprenticeship model that will integrate all phases of research with graduate and undergraduate teaching in order to train a new generation of social scientists in team-based interdisciplinary social science and community-based research methods.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.