Political Geographies of Human Accidents and Trauma Care in Mumbai's Commuter Railways

孟买通勤铁路中人类事故和创伤护理的政治地理

• 批准号: ES/X006239/1
• 负责人: Nirali Joshi
• 金额: $ 11.27万
• 依托单位: University of Sheffield
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Fellowship
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2022 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=ES%2FX006239%2F1
• 关键词: Political; Geographies; Human; Accidents; Trauma

Traffic-related trauma is now a leading cause of preventable death (WHO, 2009-2018), especially in low and middle income countries (LMICs), and is gaining increasing attention in policy, planning and scientific research. Scholars working on both prevention and access to trauma care in the global south have underscored persisting challenges in the form of multiplication of legislation, lack of co-ordination between planning agencies, fragmentation of statistics and severe resource deficits (Bhalla et al., 2017, 2019; Mohan, 1984; Sanghavi et al., 2009). While existing scholarship concentrates mostly on road-fatality, this study contributes insights on railway-trauma in the context of Mumbai, where hundreds of lives are lost or incapacitated yearly in track-related incidents across the city. Nearly a third of the dead remain untraced. The research combines archival data and legal and policy analysis with a multi-sited ethnography of accident-work with a range of people - emergency response, medical care, investigation and case closure, and adjudication for compensation - as well as those involved in health and death care activism. Through this multi-focus on law, policy and practice, the research develops a nuanced, historical and systematic account of state response to human accidents in Mumbai. The findings offer extremely valuable insights for efforts in reducing the number of deaths and injuries in railways in India, addressing the needs and concerns of frontline agents in performing their roles in trauma and death care, and in securing appropriate support and justice for victims and their families.A key finding of the dissertation is how 'accident-care' is produced as 'accident-al care', and the effects it has on both accident-victims and accident-attendants. On the one hand, human accidents are marginalised through abstracted systems of legal classification and jurisdictional fragmentation between the railway and the city. Legal classification of human accidents as outcomes of individual deviant behaviour within railway administrative law serves to depoliticise accidental injury and absolve the railways of accountability. It also severely undermines the scope of justice for victims and family. At the same time, the codification of accidents as medico-legal cases within criminal law expands the role of police and other state agents in their after-life. However, within the broader political economy of trauma care in India with its absence of a robust pre-hospital system, the police start to become less of the keen investigators and more of victim-carers in this encounter with the accident, what I call the 'accident-al' accomplishment of accident-care. Considering that a large number of accidents result in death and several of the dead remain unidentified/untraced, the involvement of the police is extended further into the domain of social management of death too. During the fellowship, I will consolidate my existing research on this topic, making its findings available to academics as well as policy makers, practictioners, and the wider public.This will be achieved via written pieces for both academic and non-academic audiences in the form of journal papers, blog articles and presentations at conferences; and development of a manuscript project proposal. In addition, two stakeholder engagement events will be held to share my research findings and address the key opportunities and challenges facing institutional actors who are at the front lines of public health and deathcare provisioning in India.This will also promote the value of knowledge exchange. A period will also be spent back out in the field to undertake new research in institutional archives. Additionally, the fellowship will contribute to career and personal development through offer of advanced skills and methods training, mentorship for developing future research grant proposals, as well as opportunity to build wider networks and collaboration.

与交通有关的创伤现在是可预防死亡的主要原因(世卫组织，2009-2018年)，特别是在低收入和中等收入国家，并在政策、规划和科学研究中受到越来越多的关注。在全球南部研究预防和获得创伤护理的学者强调了立法倍增、规划机构之间缺乏协调、统计数据分散和严重的资源短缺等形式的长期挑战(Bhala等人，2017、2019年；Mohan，1984；Sanghavi等人，2009)。虽然现有的学术研究主要集中在道路死亡上，但这项研究以孟买为背景，贡献了对铁路创伤的见解，孟买每年有数百人在与轨道有关的事故中丧生或丧失工作能力。近三分之一的死者仍然下落不明。这项研究将档案数据、法律和政策分析与事故工作的多地点民族志结合在一起，涉及一系列人-紧急反应、医疗、调查和案件结案、赔偿裁决-以及参与健康和死亡护理活动的人。通过对法律、政策和实践的多重关注，这项研究开发了一个细微差别的、历史的和系统的孟买国家对人类事故的反应。这些发现为减少印度铁路的伤亡人数，解决一线人员在创伤和死亡护理中发挥作用的需求和关切，以及为受害者及其家人提供适当的支持和正义提供了非常有价值的见解。论文的一个关键发现是，事故护理是如何产生的，以及它对事故受害者和事故处理人员的影响。一方面，通过抽象的法律分类体系和铁路与城市之间的司法分割，人为事故被边缘化。在法律上将人为事故归类为铁路行政法中个人越轨行为的结果，是为了使意外伤害去政治化，并免除铁路的责任。它还严重破坏了受害者和家人的正义范围。与此同时，将事故编纂为刑法中的法医案件，扩大了警察和其他国家特工在他们死后的作用。然而，在印度创伤护理的更广泛的政治经济中，由于缺乏强大的院前系统，警方在这起事故中开始变得不那么热心的调查人员，而是更多的受害者护理人员，这被我称为事故护理的“事故-al”成就。考虑到大量事故导致死亡，一些死者身份不明/下落不明，警方的参与也进一步扩展到死亡的社会管理领域。在研究金期间，我将巩固我对这一主题的现有研究，将其结果提供给学者、政策制定者、实践者和更广泛的公众。这将通过面向学术和非学术受众的书面文章来实现，形式包括期刊论文、博客文章和在会议上的陈述；以及开发手稿项目提案。此外，还将举办两个利益相关者参与活动，分享我的研究成果，并解决印度公共卫生和临终关怀提供第一线的机构参与者面临的主要机遇和挑战。这也将促进知识交流的价值。还将在外地花费一段时间对机构档案进行新的研究。此外，该研究金将通过提供先进的技能和方法培训，为制定未来的研究资助提案提供指导，以及建立更广泛的网络和合作机会，促进职业和个人发展。