Data, decisions, and drinking water safety: an interdisciplinary analysis of the complex adaptive response to monitoring in rural Kenya

Thesis

For decades, international and national development efforts have endeavoured to improve rural drinking-water safety in Sub-Saharan Africa by focusing on infrastructure provision, devolving responsibility for operations and maintenance to the community level. Rural areas continue, however, to have severely limited access to both safe water and to water quality information for operational decision-making. This thesis argues that sustained provision of safe water is an emergent functio...

Expand abstract

Authors: Nowicki, S

• DOI: 10.5287/ora-yekoy7ykv
• Type of award: DPhil
• Level of award: Doctoral
• Awarding institution: University of Oxford
• Language: English
• Keywords: structurationist systems framing; interdisciplinary; leverage points; public service delivery; dilemma analysis; public health; behaviour change; complex adaptive systems; water quality; drinking water; environmental health; water safety; information ethics; risk management; water security; rural water services; stakeholder analysis; E. coli; fear appeal; structurationism; institutional pluralism; rural water supply; Escherichia coli; information feedback; water safety planning; decision theory; decision analysis; systems analysis
• Subjects: Rural poor; Environmental health; Rural development; Water quality management; Sustainable development--Africa, Sub-Saharan; Human behavior; Water-supply; Rural health; Drinking water; Feedback control systems; Interdisciplinary research; Drinking water--Analysis