Falaj Communities in Oman: A Case for Local Governance?

Bandyopadhyay, Soumyen ORCID: 0000-0003-3231-9166 and Mershen, Birgit ORCID: 0000-0002-7863-8843 (2022) Falaj Communities in Oman: A Case for Local Governance? Journal of Material Cultures in the Muslim World, 3 (1). pp. 6-47.

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Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1163/26666286-12340028

Abstract

<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title> <jats:p>This contribution studies the complex arrangement of legal, socio-economic, and technical aspects of the <jats:italic>aflāj</jats:italic> (s. <jats:italic>falaj)</jats:italic> water distribution and irrigation system, and how they have shaped communities and built environments in Oman, where the <jats:italic>falaj</jats:italic> has provided the virtual lifeline of oasis life since the first millennium <jats:sc>BCE</jats:sc>. Three case studies of <jats:italic>falaj</jats:italic> communities are presented, Birkat al-Mawz, al-Ḥamrāʾ, and Misfāt al-ʿAbrīyin, which developed during the prosperous early-Yaʿrubi period in the mid-eleventh/seventeenth century. It investigates the extent to which the Ibāḍī-Islamic legal framework allowed flexibility for the local governance, management, and organisation of this ancient system, and its adaptation to diverse demographic, environmental, and emergent socio-political conditions.</jats:p>

Item Type:	Article
Divisions:	Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences > School of the Arts
Depositing User:	Symplectic Admin
Date Deposited:	20 Mar 2023 15:48
Last Modified:	15 Mar 2024 08:55
DOI:	10.1163/26666286-12340028
Related URLs:	Publisher
URI:	https://livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk/id/eprint/3169173