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Fakultäten » Philosophische Fakultät » Ethnologisches Seminar » Prof. Dr. Shalini Randeria (emeritiert) » Rest
Completed research project
| Title / Titel | Water Power. Discourses on Modernity and Development around the Nepalese Arun-3 Hydropower Project. | ||||
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| Abstract (PDF, 14 KB) | |||||
| Summary / Zusammenfassung | Since its inception over 20 years ago the flagship Arun-3 dam and hydro-electricity project in Nepal has been surrounded by controversy on local, national as well as transnational levels. Following the only successful complaint to the Inspection Panel of the World Bank to date, the international financial institution decided to withdraw in 1995 from financing the project. Ironically, the majority of people in the Upper Arun valley itself greeted the withdrawal of foreign funds and the ensuing building freeze with disappointment, though these were widely represented as an example of successful local resistance. The residents of the valley had pinned their hopes instead on employment in the project construction, the ease of access that the new road would provide in this rather isolated and inaccessible region of eastern Nepal and the comforts that electrification would bring to their villages. The local reaction with its high expectations of modernity and development thus goes against the grain of the vast social scientific literature on dams and development, which has been rather one-sidedly focussed on local resistance against dams worldwide. Arun-3 tells another story. After the end of the subsequent civil war between the Maoist movement and the state and in the wake of the rise of Nepal‘s economically strong neighbours, China and India, there has been an increased geo-political interest in Nepal’s strategic water resources. The government of Nepal announced the resumption of Arun-3 by the Indian state-owned SJVN in 2008, adding yet another layer of conflict to the vexed project by allowing the allocation of nearly 80 per cent of the energy generated to the foreign investor. Through a multi-sited ethnography the dissertation aims to delineate the discourses on development, modernity and backwardness that have emerged around the twisted tale of Arun-3. The study will analyze national and transnational civil society discourses, media representations and political debates as well as World Bank documents in order to explore the entanglements of sites and scales. It will contrast the narratives of national and local activists, external experts and local community to explore local expectations and understandings of development in order to provide a fine-grained ethnographic account of the multiplicity of temporalities involved. The research is conducted at the University Research Priority Program Asia and Europe (Research Field Norms and Social Order(s)). |
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| Keywords / Suchbegriffe | Development, Modernity, Hydropower, Nepal | ||||
| Project leadership and contacts / Projektleitung und Kontakte |
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| Other links to external web pages | http://www.ethno.uzh.ch http://www.asienundeuropa.uzh |
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| Funding source(s) / Unterstützt durch |
Foundation Dissertation Project at the University Research Priority Program (URPP) Asia and Europe. Financing Institutions: Humer Stiftung für akademische Nachwuchskräfte: Sep. 2009 – Aug. 2012 |
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| In collaboration with / In Zusammenarbeit mit |
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| Duration of Project / Projektdauer | Sep 2009 to Aug 2012 |