Dissertation Research: Understanding Technical Interventions to Improve Sanitation in Cities of India: A Technology Studies Perspective

科学和社会学位论文改进补助金将支持收集实证数据，以便通过研究印度城市棚户区改善卫生服务的努力，为科学和技术研究(STS)中关于专业知识和城市基础设施的文献做出贡献。这项研究将提高我们对技术专长的理解，并有助于卫生工程师和城市环境政策制定者努力将较贫穷的城市转变为更具包容性和可持续的地方。该研究项目有三个主要目标：在普遍忽视这一问题的背景下，评估最近在印度棚户区采取的一些卫生干预措施的有效性；了解技术专家如何通过审议和包容性进程最好地与非政府组织和城市贫民合作；以及改善印度城市棚户区卫生基础设施的运作。中心研究问题紧跟研究目标和研究方法。首先，在普遍存在的不卫生政治背景下，当代棚户区卫生努力的相对有效性是什么？第二，在创建更具参与性和公正性的卫生基础设施方面，用户、非政府组织和市政技术专家之间的互动是什么性质？第三，这项研究为改善卫生基础设施和工程课程提供了哪些一般性经验教训？该研究项目将包括两个部分。第一部分将分析代表印度公共卫生系统选择范围的四个案例的现有文件：班加罗尔的尼尔马拉付费使用厕所；艾哈迈达巴德实施的贫民窟联网项目；班加罗尔公用事业公司发起的创新；以及浦那的社区驱动的厕所堵塞。这项分析将比较确定哪些干预措施最好地实现了积极的卫生政治的努力。第二阶段将详细审查选定的努力，以了解专家、用户和中间人之间的互动如何创造一个文化上的技术变革空间，称为技术休息期。通过对选定的三个地点的社区参与的卫生努力进行经验研究，以反映满足卫生需要的三种不同技术办法，对技术休会进行了审查。该研究将采用半结构化访谈和直接观察相结合的方法来收集经验数据。NSF的资金将支持通过采访在印度收集数据。将对用户、中间人和专家组进行大约45次半结构化访谈。这项研究设想了两个主要的智力贡献。其主要贡献是通过将技术休息区构成用户、专家和中间人之间互动的空间，了解改变社会中根深蒂固的技术专门知识结构的机制和手段。这项研究的次要目的是通过审查技术休息区内的变革与休息区用户为提高全市基础设施系统的包容性所作的努力之间的联系，为关于专门知识和大型技术系统的技术研究文献作出贡献。这项研究的更广泛影响集中在改善像印度这样的发展中国家赤贫人口在城市范围内的卫生设施实践。这项研究的第二个影响将是掌握如何改变工程教育法，以便将积极的政治纳入其中。这项研究的最后一个社会意义将是建议社会基础设施的技术发展政策需要如何适应社会环境。

This Science and Society Dissertation Improvement Grant will support the gathering of empirical data in order to contribute to the literatures on expertise and urban infrastructures within Science and Technology studies (STS) through a study of the efforts to improve sanitation services within squatter settlements in urban India. The study will improve our understanding of technological expertise and contribute to the efforts of sanitary engineers and urban environmental policy makers to transform poorer cities into more inclusive and sustainable places. The research project has three main objectives: to assess the effectiveness of some recent sanitation interventions in squatter settlements in India in the context of a pervasive neglect of the issue; to understand how technical experts can best work with non-governmental organizations and the urban poor through deliberative and inclusive processes; and to improve the functioning of sanitary infrastructure in squatter settlements in urban India. The central research questions closely follow the study's objectives and research methodology. First, what is the relative effectiveness of contemporary sanitary efforts in squatter settlements in the context of a pervasive politics of insanitation? Second, what is the nature of interaction among users, NGO organizations, and municipal technical experts in creating more participatory and just sanitary infrastructures? Third, what general lessons does this study provide to improving sanitation infrastructures and engineering curriculum? The research project will have two components. The first part will analyze existing documents for four cases that represent the range of public sanitation system options in India: Nirmala pay-and-use toilets in Bangalore; the Slum Networking Project implemented in Ahmedabad; innovations initiated by the public utility in Bangalore; and a community driven toilet block in Pune. The analysis will compare the efforts to determine which interventions best actualize a positive politics of sanitation. The second stage will examine in detail the selected efforts to understand how the interaction among experts, users and intermediaries creates a culturally located space of technological change called the technological recess. The technological recess is examined through an empirical study of community-involved sanitation efforts at three sites selected to reflect three different technical approaches to meeting sanitation needs. The study will employ a combination of semi-structured interviews and direct observations to gather empirical data. NSF funding will support data gathering in India through interviews. Approximately 45 semi-structured interviews will be conducted of users, intermediaries, and expert groups. Two major intellectual contributions are envisaged in this study. The primary contribution is to understand the mechanics and means for transforming the ingrained structures of technical expertise in society by constituting the technological recess as a space for interaction among users, experts and intermediaries. The secondary aim of this study is to contribute to the technology studies literature on expertise and large technical systems by examining the linkages of the transformations within the technological recess to efforts by users in the recess to improve the inclusivity of city-wide infrastructure systems. The broader impact of the study centers on improving the practice of sanitation at an urban scale among desperately poor people in a developing country like India. A secondary impact of this study will be to grasp how engineering pedagogy can be altered to incorporate within it a positive politics. A final societal relevance of this study will be to recommend how policies for technological development for social infrastructures need to be socially situated.