Dissertation Research: History, Cultural Models, and Property Rights in the Emergence of Groundwater Irrigation: The Upper Valley of Cochabamba, Bolivia

Catholic University Of America, Washington DC

Investigators

Abstract

This dissertation research project in cultural anthropology will examine the emergence of new forms of property rights in the recent adoption of groundwater irrigation by farmers in the Cochabamba valley of highland Bolivia. Historically farmers had used water from descending rivers and streams stored in reservoirs to irrigate their fields, but in recent times they developed the capacity to use well water. Comparable systems that have been studied at first have appeared unstructured and chaotic, but upon analysis have appeared to be products of innovation, adaptation, learning and entrepreneurial skill. The student will analyze the cultural models of property rights held by farmers as well as the transaction costs of alternative forms of property rights, study the history of institutions governing groundwater usage and use GIS and spatial analysis to identify locations and spatial systems, to analyze how local Andean property rights have adapted to a new economic strategy. The student's project will make a significant contribution by widening the "New Institutional Economics" approach to include cultural models, symbols and meaning, and will advance our understanding of high altitude irrigation systems, as well as our knowledge of this important region of the world. In addition the project contributes to the training of a young social scientist.