Document Type : Applied Article
Authors
1 Associate Professor of Sociology, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Kurdistan, Sanandaj, Iran.
2 Postdoctoral researcher at the University of Kurdistan, Department of Sociology, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Kurdistan, Sanandaj, Iran.
Abstract
The water crisis in Iran has been viewed as a natural tragedy, and the solutions to address it have been primarily understood within hydrological discussions as centralized, technocratic, and lacking participatory mechanisms. The present study rejects this perspective and, adopting a bottom-up approach along with Ostrom's theory of common resource governance and the theory of social hydrology, seeks to analyze the narratives of farmers in the villages of Dehgolan in confronting the water crisis and its relationship with their lifeworld. The fundamental assumption has been that farmers, as the first and most important stakeholders of water resources, possess a distinct understanding and approach to confrontation. The resulting data have been interpreted and explained as rich socio-political texts, aiming to reveal how the ecological water crisis is intertwined with governance crisis, social justice, and institutional marginalization. The narrative analysis methodology was adopted, and to this end, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 23 farmers from 11 villages in Dehgolan County. The findings were interpreted and explained through 5 secondary categories and 1 core category. The results indicated that the lifeworld of farmers in this critical situation and water governance has become fragile. The fragility of the lifeworld of Dehgolan farmers stems from the triple interaction of weak institutional governance, the dominance of market rules, and impractical environmental awareness. These factors have led to reactive behaviors among farmers in this context, resulting in socio-cultural transformation and the denial of their collective agency by institutions and each other. Therefore, a paradigm shift in governance (transitioning from centralized to participatory approaches) and a redefinition of the relationship between the market, the environment, and society seem necessary, whereby the role and position of farmers become central to the participation and management of water resources.
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