The Cool Water Effect: Why Human Civilization Turned towards Emancipation in Cold-Wet Regions

自贾里德·戴蒙德（Jared Diamond）以来，关于西方文明解放动力的长期驱动力的文献不断涌现。为这一奖学金，我打算详细阐述在我自己的工作中证明的一个理论不足的观察：文献中引用的大多数长期驱动因素与特定的地理气候配置混淆-冷水（CW-）条件，即寒冷季节与连续降雨的结合。从这一点出发，我想深入探讨三个问题。首先，CW条件体现了解放动力的种子，因为它赋予人们至关重要的基层权利，如在获得水、粮食生产和家庭组建方面的自主权。第二，随着更复杂的社会组织--从私人公司到志愿协会再到国家行政机构--的形成，种子开始发芽：在基层组织的存在下，社会组织通过解放斗争而发展，在这些斗争中，群体要求自由，然后变得越来越坚定。第三，加速全球化是将解放斗争移植到没有CW条件的世界地区，从而放松地理对社会选择的控制。事实上，我计划使用世界上所有国家的数据。这些数据记录了沿着一系列历史层面的情况，从殖民时代、工业时代和信息时代的前夕一直到今天。总的来说，这个项目的目标是双重的：（1）理论--进一步发展我的三个主要命题的论据;（2）经验--巩固和扩展已经存在的，尽管是初步的证据。

Since Jared Diamond, there is a burgeoning literature on the long-term drivers of Western civilization's emancipatory dynamic. Contributing to this scholarship, I intend to elaborate on an under-theorized observation evidenced in my own work: most long-term drivers cited in the literature are confounded with a particular geo-climatic configuration – the Cool Water (CW-) condition, that is, the combination of cold seasons with continuous rain. Taking this observation as the point of departure, I wish to examine three propositions in-depth. First, the CW-condition embodies the seed of emancipatory dynamics because it endows people with vital grass-roots autonomies, like autonomy in water access, food production and household formation. Second, the seed began to germinate as more complex social organizations – from private corporations to voluntary associations to state administration – formed: in the presence of grass-roots autonomies, social organization evolves through emancipatory struggles in which groups claim freedoms, which then become increasingly firmly encultured. Third, accelerating globalization is transplanting emancipatory struggles into world regions without the CW-condition, thus loosening geography's grip on social choice.My proposed project is global in coverage and long-term in its temporal orientation. Indeed, I plan to use data for all countries of the world. These data capture conditions along a sequence of historical layers, from the eve of the colonial, industrial and information ages until today. I intend to explore the linkages leading from preceding to subsequent layers of history.Overall, the goal of this project is two-fold: (1) THEORY - further developing the arguments informing my three main propositions; (2) EMPIRICS - consolidating and expanding the already existing, albeit preliminary evidence.