Doctoral Dissertation Research: Claiming Space, Redefining Politics: Road Blockades and the Articulation of Grassroots Power in Urban Bolivia

博士生Carwil R.James(纽约市立大学研究生中心)将在Marc Edelman博士的指导下，研究城市抗议活动的空间逻辑和影响，特别关注公共空间的破坏性大规模抗议活动，如道路封锁和占领市中心。这些大规模抗议活动是否像一些观察家所说的那样，引入并促进了“从政”的新方式？通过将这些抗议活动作为变革性事件进行研究，这项研究将促进社会科学对社会抗议活动和空间政治利用的理解。研究将在玻利维亚的两个地点进行，科恰班巴和苏克雷都以城市抗议活动而闻名。研究人员将使用社会科学研究方法的混合来收集数据，包括：社会运动中的参与者观察；组织者、参与者和国家行为者的访谈和延长的生活史；以及对各种媒体和档案来源的分析。通过这些方法，研究人员将确定(1)城市的政治和种族地理；(2)活跃的社会运动的议程和联盟；(3)以及他们的政治目标和他们的抗议实践之间的联系。这项研究对社会科学很重要，因为它将开创新的方法来调查民族志深度的短期、有影响力的事件。通过对政治生活的多个方面的密切关注，这项研究还将有助于理解公共的、占空间的抗议活动对参与者、政治制度以及政治和种族分层的城市地理的影响。支持这项研究也支持社会科学家的教育。

Doctoral candidate Carwil R. James (City University of New York Graduate Center), with the guidance of Dr. Marc Edelman, will investigate the spatial logic and effects of urban protest activities, with a particular focus on disruptive mass protests in public space, such as road blockades and occupations of city centers. Have these mass protests, as some observers suggest, introduced and facilitated new ways of "doing politics"? By studying these protests as transformative events, this study will advance social scientific understanding of the social protest and the political use of space.The research will be carried out in two sites in Bolivia, Cochabamba and Sucre, both known for urban protests. The researcher will use a mixture of social science research methodologies to gather data, including: participant observation in social movements; interviews and extended life histories of organizers, participants, and state actors; and analyses of a variety of media and archival sources. Through these methods, the researcher will determine (1) the political and racial geography of the city; (2) the agendas and alliances of active social movements; (3) and connections between their political goals and their practices of protest.This research is important for social science because it will pioneer new methodologies for investigating short, impactful events in ethnographic depth. Through its close attention to multiple aspects of political life, this research also will contribute to understanding the effects of public, space-claiming protest activities on the participants, the political system, and politically and racially stratified urban geography. Supporting this research also supports the education of a social scientist.