1. Introduction; Water, Politics and Conflict.


Welcome to my blog! I am a 4th year Bachelor of Arts & Sciences student and have previously focussed my studies on Anthropology, Politics, Computer Science and Arabic. My interest in water and development began when spending a total of 6 months in Morocco during my first 2 years of UCL, where in the first summer I volunteered at an eco-project by the south west coast and then in the second summer interned at a human rights organisation in the Saharan region near the Atlas mountains. Here I experienced first-hand how water scarcity cause unrest in daily life and is thus eternally contributing to the cycle of poverty, violence and lack of resources. Following this, in my third year of university I spent a year in Israel/ Palestine, here I was first introduced to the centrality of water in politics through the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (where Palestinian water resources are controlled by Israeli authorities leading to the heightened economic and political power of Israel yet breaching the human rights of Palestinians alongside lowering their living standard and economic opportunity). Furthermore, for my undergraduate dissertation I will be writing on the role of water in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict through the lens of digital ethnography, alongside analysing the feasibility of blockchain implementation to solve issues of water management. Thus I expect that my research and knowledge on this area will influence the ensuing blog!

Author's own photo. The image shows a disputed watering hole, where Palestinian farmers dangerously bring livestock through still-active mine sites in dispute with Israeli settlers who claim the hole as a religious site to be used for pre-prayer cleansing. 

For this site I will focus on the North African region, on account of my personal experiences in Morocco and in the Israel-Palestine region which I see as comparable to North Africa due to the influences of Islam as well as being tumultuous areas regarding politics and conflict. Within North West Africa one can also clearly perceive commonalities between the majority-islamic culture alongside a large Bedouin population, as well as the geographical similarity of being a physically water stressed desert region.



















Comments

  1. Daniel SeifuOctober 30, 2019 at 4:55 AM

    Hi,
    I really like your personal justification for why you have chosen this specific research area, it is an engaging way to begin your blog posts.

    Maybe you could mention about Sen's theory in relation to food scarcity and resource management in North Africa. This could be a way of exploring the political aspects of famine and food shortages in that region.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. SamHalsallOctober 31, 2019 at 5:19 AM

      This comment has been removed by the author.

      Delete
    2. SamHalsallOctober 31, 2019 at 5:20 AM

      hey thanks for this advice - I shall investigate !

      Delete

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