In the social sciences, social constructionism has come to be known as one of the most important paradigms and has been widely applied in psychology, sociology and human sciences (Korsgaard, 2007). Social constructionism could be described as a perception which advances the belief that a human life subsists because of social and interpersonal influences. Thus it concentrates on exploring influences of society on individual and communal life rather than genetic inheritance. Thus, social constructionism focuses on the involvedness and interrelationship of the various aspects of people within their societies (Owen, 1995; Turnbull,
Page 20 of 246
2002). There are three basic characteristics of social constructionism: firstly it is argued that reality is socially constructed, secondly it focuses on the constructive force of language and finally it is a strategy of analysis in that people determine the objective reality of society through language, rendering it meaningful and thus being accepted by individuals (Berngartt, 2004; Boghossian, 2001, p. 4).
According to Turnbull (2002) Social Constructionists believe that individuals play a vital role in historical, political and cultural change of particular events and places. Likewise, Boghossian (2001) argued that Social Construction Theory is applied to explain our beliefs about worldly items, things and facts. According to Owen (1995, p. 1):
Apart from the inherited and developmental aspects of humanity, social constructionism hypothesizes that all other aspects of humanity are created, maintained and destroyed in our interactions with others through time. The social practices of all life begin, are recreated in the present and eventually end.
Social constructionism is a theoretical orientation that emphasizes the process and meaning of relationships between the individuals and their practice of construction of culture in a varying environment with historical time (Stead, 2004). According to Stead (2004), from a social constructionist viewpoint culture may be illustrated as a social actions, perceptions, meanings and social structure of communal symbols, which are commonly exchanged in the relationships of people with others. However, all people in a culture do not have equal access to all types of resources. Language is regarded as a basis for social interaction to understand the reality of a particular group (McFarlane, 2011).
Generally, the continuum of constructionist approaches ranges from realism to relativism (Järvensivu & Törnroos, 2010; Lincoln, Lynham, & Guba, 2011; McFarlane, 2011). Relativism is considered as a belief which considers everything including physical objects are social products or socially constructed (Hammersley & Atkinson, 2007). This concept implies that there are no objective truth criteria or standards. There are several truths for any set of facts. But Realism is regarded as the view that reality exists only in texts and interpretations of them (Berngartt, 2004; Hammersley & Atkinson, 2007; McFarlane, 2011). The continuum of ontological and epistemological world views, characterising realism and relativism, segments into four viewpoints. ‘Critical realism’ considers that only one, true reality exists but there are
Page 21 of 246
limitations to knowing the truth accurately. The purpose of any research through employing this approach is to move closer to knowing the reality. The truth being in this case a matter of objective, empirical observation and a consensus within the scientific audience. The ‘naïve relativist’, adhering to an extreme form of constructionism, believes that there are multiple perspectives to knowledge and truth. The study of knowledge and its creation process is the aim of research guided by this approach. Further, this approach advocates that all knowledge and truth claims are equally good. “Naïve realists” believe that there is only one true reality existing where it is possible to know exactly what that truth consists of. The purpose of research is to model reality through objective and empirical observations. Finally, “moderate constructionists” believe that there are multiple perspectives to knowledge and truth. The purpose of research through employing this approach is to generate new, usable knowledge through multiple views of the truth. The difference between this moderate approach and that of the naive relativist is that the former believes that the truth exists as dialogue, critique and consensus in different communities, usable knowledge as well as empirical evidence (Guba; Järvensivu & Törnroos, 2010; Lincoln et al., 2011). I have adopted moderate constructionism as an approach for studying the stone spout management systems of the Kathmandu Valley, Nepal. The key reason for adopting this approach is because moderate constructionism has the ability to better take into account the multiple constructed, community-bounded realities (Järvensivu & Törnroos, 2010). In addition under this approach, importance is provided to community knowledge creation. According to Järvensivu and Törnroos (2010) this moderate stance acknowledges the possibility of specific local, personal, and community forms of knowledge, but does not accept the positivist argument of a universal truth. It accepts truth as community–based and derivable from empirical data. The moderate constructionist model emphasizes a community-based, multifaceted conception of knowledge comprised of the interacting forms of truth which are generated and validated through critical dialogue and empirical evidence of various communities.
The contribution of a social constructionist approach has two benefits for the study of common property resource management. First, it clearly focuses on the construction of the common property resource users and their perceptions of “things” as resources and their external environment. This approach helps researchers to consider both the internal and contextual factors which influence the motivation of resource users for adopting particular strategies and creating institutional relationship with their resources, e.g., defining water
Page 22 of 246
spouts as common property. Second, it puts aside the limitations associated with collective action (Pagdee, Kim, & Daugherty, 2006). This research is focussed on the construction of social institutions, institutional change and the influences of social values and norms, more specifically on the ability, rights to access, and the ways of interpreting the stone spout’s water delivery resources using a cultural perspective. Using an investigation meta-theory based on four particular streams of social constructionism, namely; institution, place attachment, common property rights and central place, it is argued that a social constructionist perspective helps to understand and illuminate some hitherto less investigated aspects of traditional management systems of the stone spouts in the Kathmandu Valley.