National identity has as much to do with daily practices as it does with dramatic events. Expressions of national identity in China are often associated with passionate outbreaks of popular sentiment, most often directed against other countries. This study will consider the role of water development in creating everyday national identity by examining a recently completed water development project in Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region. Water resources development is an appropriate venue to examine the nation-building associated with daily practices, both because development plays a major role in contemporary national identity in China, and because water resources have long been associated with state power in China. This study will address the question: Does the Chinese state use water resource development to promote national identity building in western China? This question will be answered by asking two sets of sub-questions: 1) How do state entities frame the construction of water development projects in Ningxia with respect to Chinese national identity? and 2) How are such narratives interpreted by commingled ethnic Han and Hui project participants? Does development reproduce national identity in everyday practices? The first of these will be answered through a discourse analysis of state planning documents and publications intended for the general public, as well as through key-informant interviews with state planners. The second set of questions will be answered through eight months of participant observation and interviews. Participant observation will examine how daily practices of water management do or do not come to symbolize national identity. Purposefully sampled interviews with 90 individuals in three communities, each differing ethnic composition, but all affected by the same drinking water and irrigation project, will illuminate how the planned beneficiaries of a development project interpret state narratives.
This study will examine the role of water resources development in shaping national identity. It will contribute to the study of how national identities are formed on a daily basis by considering the role of economic development in such identities. This contribution will be made in the context of rural China, where previous studies have not compared national identity among Han and ethnic minority groups. This research also broadens recent research on the politics of water in China by moving beyond examining the relationships between government agencies to consider the role of water in shaping the everyday lives of individuals. This project has the potential to impact understanding of development in Chinese national identity, as well as the management of water, a crucial global resource. This project will also contribute to the education of a doctoral student, and fostering long-term academic connections between the United States and China.
