The Meaning Reconstruction of Economic Change's Consequences in Ouraman - e - Takht Region of Iranian Kurdistan: A Grounded Theory Approach

This study aims to explore the meaning reconstruction consequences economic changes in Ouramanat - Ta^t of Iranian Kurdistan. Interpretive approach was used as conceptual framework to explain the various aspects of inquiry. According to Interpretive approach, the humans are social beings who create meaning and who constantly and reflexively make sense of their worlds. Therefore, the nature of social reality is constituted of the fluid definition of situation created by human interaction. As a result, the aim of social inquiry is to understand and describe the meaningful social actions which are permanently constructed and reconstructed. Ouraman Takht is a rural and highly mountainous region located in southwest of Kurdistan province of han. The economic system of region is mainly based on husbandry, gardening and farming. However, some new economic activities have been emerging since several years ago which in turn changed and challenged the traditional economic system. So, it is important to study the Ouramian point of view towards the context, process and consequences of the new economic changes, Qualitative research methodology was employed and ethnographic fieldwork method, including of direct observation, participant observation and in depth interview, was adopted as practical strategy of conducting research. Also, grounded theory was applied to analyze data and produce a data based theory stemming from the data. The grounded theory was originally introduced by Glaser and Strauss in 1967 in opposition to the positivist theoretical principles. It is an inductive procedure to theory building rather than theory testing in terms of three different stages of data coding, containing of open coding, axial coding and selective coding, which finally lead to emerge a theory based on data. Eight main categories emerged from the collected data and coded in the axial coding process these are Ecological Problems, Shortage of Resources, Permanent Poverty, Expansion of Service Sector, Labor Migration, State based Economy, Embracing Economic Changes, and Comparative - Optimistic Evaluation. The core category extracted during selective coding process was taken to be "Subsistence’s Improvement", which captures all main categories and the whole trend of economic changes in the society studied. According to this category, People of Ouraman consider the consequences of economic changes as something positive and functional for their live. The results have been presented in a paradigm model containing of conditions, interactions and consequences around the core category. In this model the Ecological Problems, Shortage of Resources and Permanent Poverty are considered as contextual conditions the Expansion of Service Sector and Labor Migration are regarded to be the interactions, and the State based Economy, Embracing Economic Changes, and Comparative - Optimistic Evaluation are taken into account as consequences of economic changes in Ouraman region of Iranian Kurdistan.