| Description |
Scarcity is considered an ubiquitous feature of the human condition.
The scarcity postulate that human wants are unlimited and the means
to achieve them, scarce and limited underpins much modern economics.
Scarcity is widely used as an explanation for social organisation,
social conflict and the resource crunch confronting humanity's
survival on the planet. Scarcity is made out to be an all-pervasive
fact of our lives be it of housing, food, water and oil or in the
drive for nuclear power.
This talk examines how scarcity has emerged as an all pervasive
discourse in scientific and policy circles. It shows how the 'scare'
of scarcity has led to scarcity emerging as a political strategy for
powerful groups. Aggregate numbers and physical quantities are
trusted, while local knowledges and experiences of scarcity that
identify problems more accurately and specifically are ignored.
Science and technology are expected to provide 'solutions', but such
expectations embody a multitude of unexamined assumptions about the
nature of the 'problem', about the technologies and about the
institutional arrangements put forward as a 'fix.' By examining the
case of water, the talk demonstrates that scarcity is not a natural
condition: the problem lies in how we see scarcity and the ways in
which it is socially generated.
About Dr. Lyla Mehta:
Lyla Mehta is a Research Fellow at the Institute of Development
Studies at the University of Sussex and Visiting Professor, Norwegian
University of Sciences.
|