Beyond the promises of technology: A review of the discourses and actors who make drip irrigation

Drip irrigation has long been promoted as a promising way to meet today's world water, food and poverty challenges. In most scientific and policy documents, drip irrigation is framed as a technological innovation with definitive intrinsic characteristics—that of efficiency, productivity and modernit...

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Autores principales: Venot, Jean-Philippe, Zwarteveen, M.Z., Kuper, M., Boesveld, H., Kooij, S. van der, Wanvoeke, J., Benouniche, M., Errahj, M., Fraiture, Charlotte de, Verma, S.
Formato: Journal Article
Lenguaje:Inglés
Publicado: Wiley 2014
Acceso en línea:https://hdl.handle.net/10568/65993
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author Venot, Jean-Philippe
Zwarteveen, M.Z.
Kuper, M.
Boesveld, H.
Kooij, S. van der
Wanvoeke, J.
Benouniche, M.
Errahj, M.
Fraiture, Charlotte de
Verma, S.
author_browse Benouniche, M.
Boesveld, H.
Errahj, M.
Fraiture, Charlotte de
Kooij, S. van der
Kuper, M.
Venot, Jean-Philippe
Verma, S.
Wanvoeke, J.
Zwarteveen, M.Z.
author_facet Venot, Jean-Philippe
Zwarteveen, M.Z.
Kuper, M.
Boesveld, H.
Kooij, S. van der
Wanvoeke, J.
Benouniche, M.
Errahj, M.
Fraiture, Charlotte de
Verma, S.
author_sort Venot, Jean-Philippe
collection Repository of Agricultural Research Outputs (CGSpace)
description Drip irrigation has long been promoted as a promising way to meet today's world water, food and poverty challenges. In most scientific and policy documents, drip irrigation is framed as a technological innovation with definitive intrinsic characteristics—that of efficiency, productivity and modernity. Based on evidence from North and West Africa as well as South Asia, we show that there are multiple actors involved in shaping this imagery, the legitimacy of which largely stems from an engineering perspective that treats technology and potential as ‘truths’ that exist independently of the context of use. Rather than ascribing the advent of drip irrigation as a successful technology to intrinsic technical features, this paper proposes to see it as grounded in the ability drip irrigation has to lend itself to multiple contexts and discourses that articulate desirable futures. We thus adopt a view of technology whereby the ‘real’ (i.e. the drip irrigation hardware) acquires its characteristics only through, and within, the network of institutions, discourses and practices that enact it. Such a perspective sheds light on the iterative alignments that take place between hardware and context and treat these as inherent features, rather than externalities, of the innovation process. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
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spelling CGSpace659932024-05-15T05:11:33Z Beyond the promises of technology: A review of the discourses and actors who make drip irrigation Venot, Jean-Philippe Zwarteveen, M.Z. Kuper, M. Boesveld, H. Kooij, S. van der Wanvoeke, J. Benouniche, M. Errahj, M. Fraiture, Charlotte de Verma, S. Drip irrigation has long been promoted as a promising way to meet today's world water, food and poverty challenges. In most scientific and policy documents, drip irrigation is framed as a technological innovation with definitive intrinsic characteristics—that of efficiency, productivity and modernity. Based on evidence from North and West Africa as well as South Asia, we show that there are multiple actors involved in shaping this imagery, the legitimacy of which largely stems from an engineering perspective that treats technology and potential as ‘truths’ that exist independently of the context of use. Rather than ascribing the advent of drip irrigation as a successful technology to intrinsic technical features, this paper proposes to see it as grounded in the ability drip irrigation has to lend itself to multiple contexts and discourses that articulate desirable futures. We thus adopt a view of technology whereby the ‘real’ (i.e. the drip irrigation hardware) acquires its characteristics only through, and within, the network of institutions, discourses and practices that enact it. Such a perspective sheds light on the iterative alignments that take place between hardware and context and treat these as inherent features, rather than externalities, of the innovation process. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. 2014-04 2015-05-11T15:18:50Z 2015-05-11T15:18:50Z Journal Article https://hdl.handle.net/10568/65993 en Limited Access Wiley Venot, J-P., Zwarteveen, M., Kuper, M., Boesveld, H., van der Kooij, S., Wanvoeke, J., Benouniche, M., Errahj, M., de Fraiture, C. and Verma, S. (2014). Beyond the promises of technology: A review of the discourses and actors who make drip irrigation. Irrigation and Drainage, 63 (2), pp. 186-194.
spellingShingle Venot, Jean-Philippe
Zwarteveen, M.Z.
Kuper, M.
Boesveld, H.
Kooij, S. van der
Wanvoeke, J.
Benouniche, M.
Errahj, M.
Fraiture, Charlotte de
Verma, S.
Beyond the promises of technology: A review of the discourses and actors who make drip irrigation
title Beyond the promises of technology: A review of the discourses and actors who make drip irrigation
title_full Beyond the promises of technology: A review of the discourses and actors who make drip irrigation
title_fullStr Beyond the promises of technology: A review of the discourses and actors who make drip irrigation
title_full_unstemmed Beyond the promises of technology: A review of the discourses and actors who make drip irrigation
title_short Beyond the promises of technology: A review of the discourses and actors who make drip irrigation
title_sort beyond the promises of technology a review of the discourses and actors who make drip irrigation
url https://hdl.handle.net/10568/65993
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