Dissertation Research: Development and Ethnicity in Guatemala

这个项目涉及斯坦福大学的一名学生的论文研究，研究危地马拉的一个基层土著发展组织如何利用种族文化习俗来改变发展的目标和效果。该项目总部设在托托尼卡潘市，将审查一个大型发展项目--“西部农村发展合作”，以评估当地民族特性如何反映在发展活动的设计和实践中。这些方法将包括对发展组织进行密集的参与者观察，以及对8个当地社区进行普查，以评估他们参与发展项目的情况；在两个社区进行更深入的研究，其中一个社区已建立项目，另一个社区的项目刚刚制度化。这项研究很重要，因为大多数发展项目都隐含或明确地假设，当地种族将让位于更西方、欧洲、中产阶级的价值观和做法。然而，新的发展组织正在挑战这种模式，打造新的方法，将当地最好的种族认同与发达的机构结合起来。该项目将增进我们对这一新方法的了解，并有助于培训一位年轻的社会科学家。

This project involves the dissertation research of a student from Stanford University, studying how a grassroots indigenous development organization in Guatemala uses ethnic cultural practices to transform the goals and effects of development. Based in the municipality of Totonicapan, the project will examine a large development project, the `Cooperation for Western Rural Development`, to assess how local ethnic identities are reflected in the design and practice of development activities. The methods will include intensive participant observation in the development organization as well as a census of eight local communities to assess their involvement in development projects, more intensive studies in two communities, one where projects are established and one where they are just being institutionalized. This research is important because most development projects implicitly or explicitly assume that local ethnicity will give way towards more Western, European, middle-class values and practices. Yet new development organizations are contesting that model, forging new approaches to join the best of local ethnic identity with developed institutions. This project will advance our knowledge of this new approach as well as contribute to the training of a young social scientist.