PLASTIC BOTTLED WATER : FACILITING FOR URBAN COMMUNITY TO ACCESS CLEAN DRINKING WATER

Abstract

The article aimed at analyzing the facilitation of access to clean drinking water for urban people by plastic bottled water. Based on qualitative research under the concept of development towards modernity, consumer culture, and facility according to Structuration Theory by Antony Giddens. With Critical Ethnography and Dialectical Semi-Structural Interview from urban informants who are producers, distributors, and consumers. The data were analyzed by thematic analysis technique. The research found that, under the social conditions in urban communities that have changed to modernity, people are flocking to find opportunities and income by abandoning their ways of finding clean drinking water for themselves but rely on bottled water on the market, presented by producers and distributors. By trading their money earning through the sweat of labor for the facility delivered from plastic bottled water in which meet the hustle and bustle of living in the city, cleanliness, and good health. This convenience happened caused by unequal social processes, albeit not occur naturally. Urban residents are forced to be left with the only alternative to accessing clean water causing people in the urban community to succumb drinking plastic bottled water without suspicion.