Institutionalised

Our team recently met with our new interns for the year, which was exciting.  It was exciting to start our second year at SOAS and to have our second round of interns from the Department for Development Studies.  We went through the usual induction procedures and told them about our project, then spoke a little about our individual interests and how we all got into water and development.

When our interns were telling us about their interests, I realised that I was unable to escape my own framework for conceptualising development problems.  One intern was interested in the erosion of state sovereignty as a result of globalisation and another was interested in structural violence in natural resources management and issues of (in)equity within systems.  I immediately realised that both interns were interested in the roles of different institutions in international development, and they are lucky that Dr Cleaver, the project Director, specialises in institutions.  Then, I suddenly remembered that a few weeks back I was thinking of the dissertation of our former scholarship student, who wrote on the role of institutions in response to the 2008 cholera outbreaks in Zimbabwe.  Then it became evident that I was consumed by institutions and their role in water governance and governance more widely; that it is one of the main lenses through which I see development problems.

When I discuss the role of institutions, I am using a broader sense of the word, which encompasses both formal and informal institutions.  Having studied gender at a post-graduate degree, and having focused on gender and land rights in my master's dissertation, I have a foundation for beginning to explore debates on the interface between formal institutions (eg water committees) and social institutions (eg gender, class, race, sexuality).  Participation in local, national, and international water events, as well as discussions with the Water for Africa Research project team has also influenced my perspective on institutions for water and development.  Dr Cleaver also has some great publications on social institutions and natural resource management (eg 2002 "Reinventing Insitutions: Bricolage and Social Embeddedness of Natural Resource Management"; 1998 "Moral Ecological Rationality"), which have helped me to understand how a range of social factors play a role in water governance.

In development there is also a really big emphasis on "getting institutions right" which is more along the lines of Ostrom's work.  This body of work focuses on formal institutions, standardisation of systems, issues of rights, and other related things.  For example it has become a part of standard, mainstream policy to decentralise water supply systems, as well as systems for good water governance.  These decentralised institutions are thought to promote community management, local participation in decision making, and help to empower marginalised communities by giving them access to a space to have a voice.  Although there are some major limits to a focus primarily on formalised institutions, I can also see why they are important.

So between all the recent and ongoing debates I have with myself on the role of institutions, I realised that I have been "institutionalised" into institutional approaches to development.  I find it difficult to escape many times.  It is hard to ignore the role that institutions play in governance and governmentality.  They are so pervasive, so powerful.  I wonder,  is everything is about institutions?  How can I be more inclusive in my analysis of water and development?  Within the scope of development certainly there is a large interest in institutions, but how can we enable them to work together?  How are people able, or unable, to challenge the range of institutions that exist?  How can we improve these institutions to foster the equity of livelihoods?