How do state actors on the frontline of water service provision in Malawi translate policies ‘on the ground’ through their everyday practices?

Supervised by Dr Steve Connelly, Dr Sally Cawood and Professor Frances Cleaver (ext). 

My doctoral research looks at how government actors operating at the district level interpret and go about implementing Malawi's national policies for rural water supply. The research uses ethnographic methods to understand the experiences and everyday practices of these actors, exploring the constraints they face (be they financial, political or social) and the diverse strategies they employ in ‘getting the job done’. In the context of decentralised water governance, the actions of these frontline workers and their relationships with other stakeholders are integral to service sustainability and ensuring universal access to clean water.

Research aim: To understand how actors translate water policies through their everyday practices, and the strategies they employ ‘to get the job done’.

Objectives:

• To use an actor-centred ethnographic approach to explore the everyday practices of frontline service providers (district-level actors) in Malawi’s water sector, and to understand how and why such practices have emerged.
• To use rural water supply as a site of bricolage to theorise the dynamic ways in which actors (re)produce, negotiate and adapt policies and institutional arrangements, through their embodied practices.
• To help policy-makers and practitioners better understand the reality of decentralised water service delivery, providing recommendations that are informed by the lived experiences of those working ‘on the ground’.

My supervisors are Dr Stephen Connelly (University of Sheffield), Prof Frances Cleaver (University of Lancaster) and Dr Sally Cawood (University of Sheffield). I am funded by the Grantham Centre for Sustainable Futures.

Prior to my PhD, I worked for six years at the Overseas Development Institute (ODI) in London. As a Senior Research Officer on ODI’s Water Policy Programme (WPP) I participated in several interdisciplinary research projects in eastern and southern Africa, co-leading work packages on various aspects of water policy and governance. I also worked on shorter tailored pieces for donors and NGOs and contributed to funding proposals. Topics included: institutions for smallholder irrigation; sustainability of rural water services; the political economy of river basin development; climate risks and adaptation in the water sector; and securing healthy rivers for the benefit of society.

I completed an MSc in Climate Change and International Development at the University of East Anglia in 2010. This is where my interest in water took root, inspired by my supervisor at the time. My dissertation looked at mainstreaming climate adaptation in Ethiopia’s water sector. I also hold a BSc in Natural Sciences from Durham University (2007). Between degrees I worked in the UK charity sector, as well as volunteering in Zambia for eight months as a peer educator.