Social Representations and Water Culture: Daily Practices and Water elements of the Territory in the City of Piura

Abstract

Recognizing the potential of the social representations that integrate water culture at the local scale as a component of great importance to achieve sustainable territorial balance, this article analyzes through these representations the factors that shape the relationships of inhabitants with water in the city of Piura, Peru. From a qualitative approach, the meanings that emerge from the information collected in a semi-structured survey, in-depth interviews, a participatory workshop, and in documents that present situations that inhabitants do not reflect in their discourse are interpreted. It is revealed that the central representations of water show a utilitarian anthropocentric vision of water as an urban service and a way of seeing it as a common good with an attitude focused on the conservation of the resource. These socio-cognitive constructs are manifested in the daily practices of water use and are associated with the meanings attributed to water elements of the territory, such as the Piura river and the rains of the El Niño phenomenon, which integrate the local water culture. It is concluded by arguing that the knowledge of how the inhabitants relate to water, in dialogue with scientific knowledge, can contribute to the sustainable management of water resources in the territory of the northern Peruvian coast where the city is located.