Hydrosociality in the grasslands

Around the Scheldt’s estuary, where water is historically abundant, recent droughts have been hindering the fodder activities on which farmers depend to feed their cows. This thesis project looks at water management in the context of the environmental crisis and of recent policies aimed at giving more space to water. In particular, the research focuses on the dairy grasslands as the sites of daily formal and informal negotiations around the water level by following three stakeholder groups who tend to them: the farmers, local waterboards and environmentalists. The study is designed at the interface between the fields of political ecology, anthropology of climate change and an anthropology of agrarian worlds.

Research aims

This thesis explores the hydrosocial relations of the dairy grasslands of the tidal Scheldt – i.e. social relations made with and through water. In particular, the research aims to map out and describe the social relations, negotiations, conflicts and collaborations that enable or hinder the flow of water within the grasslands and that give substance to its water level.

Research methodology

The project follows three main stakeholder groups as they tend to the grasslands and narrate their water level: the dairy farmers and their cows, the local waterboard and the environmental agencies. The research methodology is qualitative and builds on long-term ethnographic fieldwork in the dairy grasslands, including participant observation in the daily activities of the stakeholder groups, semi-structured interviews, participative mapping and focus groups. Archival work in the waterboard’s administration is also undertaken. Finally, the collected data also includes photographs, short films and maps to illustrate the entanglement of hydrosocial relations.

Hydrosocial relations

Drought

Dairy farms

Political ecology

Climate change

Fonds Baillets Latour

FSR

Prof. Julie Hermesse

Gabrielle Fenton

Barbara Van Dyck (Coventry University)

Bénédicte Zitouni (UCLouvain USL-B)