Dams,Diversions, and Development: Slow Resistance and Authoritarian Rule in the Salween River Basin

We engage geography's longstanding debate on what “counts” as resistance by introducing slow resistance to account for temporal-political strategies against unjust developments, particularly under authoritarian conditions. We draw on over a decade of fieldwork in the Salween River Basin where dams and diversions have been proposed since 1979, including the most recent iteration, the Yuam River water diversion project in Northwest Thailand. We find that resistance by impacted communities and civil society encompasses slow, strategic, and considered actions over time and generations. Such resistance is necessarily protracted to contest developments (re)proposed over decades. By foregrounding the strategic use of time and temporality, we highlight often overlooked actions and strategies of resistance by a diverse range of actors, showing how resistance movements are incremental and interconnected over time, even when “under the radar”. These strategies are key to contesting and (re)shaping the conditions of development in the Basin.     

Book reviews

CHINA

ANITA CHAN. China's Workers Under Assault: the Exploitation of Labour in a Globalising Economy. Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 2001. 250 pp. US$ 22.95, paper.

YIJIANG DING. Chinese Democracy after Tiananmen. Vancouver and Toronto: UBC Press, 2001. Acknowledgments, notes, glossary, bibliography, index. 172 pp. C$75.00, hardcover.

BARBARA ENTWISLE and GAIL E. HENDERSON (eds). Re‐drawing Boundaries: work, Household and Gender in China. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000. x, 344 pp. US$19.95, paper.

XIN LIU. In One's Own Shadow: an Ethnographic Account of the Condition of Post‐Reform Rural China. Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University Press, 2000. xvi, 246 pp. Illustrations, preface, notes, glossary, bibliography, index. US$15.95, paper.

XUEPING ZHONG. Masculinity Besieged? Issues of Modernity and Male Subjectivity in Chinese Literature of the Late Twentieth Century. Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2000. 208 pp. Bibliography. US$49.95, hardcover; US$17.95, paper.

JAPAN, KOREA

MARIUS B. JANSEN. The Making of Modern Japan. Cambridge and London: Harvard University Press/Belknap, 2000. xviii, 871 pp. US$35.00, hardcover.

MICHAEL MARRA (trans. and ed.) A History of Modern Japanese Aesthetics. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2001. 398 pp. Glossary, chronology, bibliography, index. US$32.95; US$69.20, paper.

SOUTH, WEST AND CENTRAL ASIA

A. K. HELLUM. A Painter's Year in the Forests of Bhutan. Edmonton and Honolulu: University of Alberta/University of Hawai'i Press, 2001. 120 pp. Appendix, bibliography. US$35.00, paper.

PRADIP N. KHANDWALLA. Revitalizing the State: a Menu of Options. New Delhi: Sage Publications, 1999. 303 pp. Rs. 250, paper.

SHOMPA LAHIRI. Indians in Britain: Anglo‐Indian Encounters, Race and Identity 1880–1930. Portland, OR: Frank Cass, 2000. 249 pp. Glossary, bibliography, index. US$59.50, hardcover; US$24.50 paper.

SOUTHEAST ASIA

Economic Development of Burma: a Vision and a Strategy. A Study by Burmese Economists. Stockholm: Olof Palme International Center; Singapore: Singapore University Press, 2000. 233 pp. S$30.00, paper.     

Book reviews

CHINA

RONALD SULESKI. Civil Government in Warlord China: tradition, Modernization and Manchuria. New York: Peter Lang, 2002. 302 pp. Bibliography, index. US$66.95, hardcover.

BØRGE BAKKEN. The Exemplary Society: human Improvement, Social Control, and the Dangers of Modernity in China. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. 516 pp. Notes, bibliography, glossary, index. A$300.00, hardcover.

DU SHANSHAN. "Chopsticks Only Work in Pairs”. Gender Unity and Gender Equality Among the Lahu of Southwest China. New York: Columbia University Press, 2002. US$60.00, hardcover; US$25.50, paper.

REBECCA E. KARL. Staging the World: Chinese Nationalism at the Turn of the Twentieth Century. Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2002. US$59.95, hardcover; US$19.95, paper.

ELIZABETH J. PERRY. Challenging the Mandate of Heaven: social Protest and State Power in China. New York: M.E. Sharpe, 2002. US$73.95, hardcover; US$27.95, paper.

JAPAN AND KOREA

STEVE ODIN. Artistic Detachment in Japan and the West: psychic Distance in Comparative Aesthetics. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2001. 204 pp. Index. US$55.00, hardcover; US$19.95, paper.

VERA MACKIE. Feminism in Modern Japan. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003. xiv, 293 pp. £50.00, hardcover; £18.95, paper.

KAYE BROADBENT. W omen's Employment in Japan: the Experience of Part‐time Workers. London and New York: RoutledgeCurzon, 2003. 176 pp. US$90.00/£55.00, hardcover.

JAMES R. BRANDON and SAMUEL L. LEITER (eds). Kabuki Plays on Stage: Darkness and Desire, 1804–1864. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2002. xv, 397 pp. 31 colour and 14 b/w plates, glossary, selected bibliography, contributors, index, list of plays by volume, dust jacket. US$50.00, hardcover.

KONGDAN OH (ed). Korea Briefing 1997–1999: challenges and Change at the Turn of the Century. Published in cooperation with the Asia Society. New York: M.E. Sharpe, 2000. 243 pp. Preface, map, chronology, glossary, suggestions for further reading and websites, index. US$30.95, paper.

KONGDAN OH and RALPH HASSIG (eds). Korea Briefing 2000–2001: first Steps Toward Reconciliation and Reunification. Published in cooperation with the Asia Society. Armonk: M.E. Sharpe, 2002. 308 pp. Maps, tables, bibliography, chronology, index. US$24.95, paper.

The Korean Peninsula: peace and Prosperity after the Pyongyang Summit (Proceedings of a Conference 6–7 October 2000). New Zealand Asia Institute: The University of Auckland, 2001. 146 pp. New Zealand domestic price $NZ20.00 or equivalent incl. postage and packing. Overseas price $NZ30.00 or equivalent incl. postage and packing.

YONGHO CH'OE, PETER H. LEE, and W.M. THEODORE DE BARY (eds). Sources of Korean Tradition, Volume 2: from the Sixteenth to the Twentieth Centuries. New York: Columbia University Press, 2000. Preface, explanatory note, contributors, bibliography, index. US$54.00, hardcover; US$22.50, paper.

SEIJI M. LIPPIT. Topographies of Japanese Modernism. New York: Columbia University Press, 2002. 301 pp. US$22.50/£16.50, paper.

SOUTH, WEST & CENTRAL ASIA

ALF HILTEBEITEL. Rethinking the Mahàbhàrata: a Reader's Guide to the Education of the Dharma King. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001. x, 365 pp. US$50.00, hardcover; US$25.00, paper.

ALI AMJAD. Labour Legislation and Trade Unions in India and Pakistan. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001. xix, 190 pp. £15.99, hardcover.

LIONEL CAPLAN. Children of Colonialism: Anglo‐Indians in a Postcolonial World. Oxford and New York: Berg, 2001. x, 261 pp. US$75.00, hardcover; US$25.00, paper.

JACQUES POUCHEPADASS. Land, Power and Market: a Bihar District under Colonial Rule, 1860–1947. New Delhi, Thousand Oaks, London: Sage Publications, 2000. 574 pp. Tables, figures, maps, appendixes, abbreviations, glossary, introduction, sources and bibliography, index. Rs 695, hardcover.

SOUTHEAST ASIA

THOMAS M. McKENNA. Muslim Rulers and Rebels: everyday Politics and Armed Separatism in the Southern Philippines. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998. 364 pp. £37.95, hardcover; £16.95, paper.

JEROEN TOUWEN. Shipping and Trade in the Java Sea Region, 1870–1940: a Collection of Statistics on the Major Java Sea Ports. Leiden: KITLV Press, 2001. xi, 172 pp. Tables, figures, bibliography.

DANIEL FITZPATRICK. Land Claims in East Timor. Canberra: Asia‐Pacific Press, 2002. x, 246 pp. A$40.00.

GEORGE McT. KAHIN. Southeast Asia: a Testament. London and New York: RoutledgeCurzon, 2003. xxiv, 350 pp. £75.00, hardcover; £19.99, paper.

BOB HERING. Sukarno: founding Father of Indonesia 1901–1945. Leiden: KITLV [Koninklijk Instituut voor Taal‐, Land‐ en Volkenkunde] Press, 2002. 439 pp. Euro30.00, paper.

POLINE BALA. Changing Borders and Identities in the Kelabit Highlands: anthropological Reflections on Growing Up in a Kelabit Village near the International Border Dayak Studies Contemporary Society Series, no. 1. The Institute of East Asian Studies, Sarawak Malaysia: Unit Penerbitan Universiti Malaysia Sarawak, 2002. 142 pp. Bibliography, glossary, index, images. No price given, paper.     

Constrained Labour Agency and the Changing Regulatory Regime in China

Using the concept of ‘constrained agency’ introduced by Neil Coe and David Jordhus‐Lier, this article attempts to evaluate the possibilities and constraints facing labour agency in the Pearl River Delta in China. By reviewing the social, economic and political background of the changing labour market and labour regulations in China, and through an intensive case study of a workers’ strike and its consequences, the author argues that Chinese migrant workers have begun to challenge the state's regulatory regime on labour, which is based on individual rights. However, the introduction of a regulatory framework based on collective rights is being impeded by the party‐state's manipulation of trade unions and the strong influence of global capital on local labour policy.     

‘Life in Happy Land’: using virtual space and doing motherhood in Hong Kong

This paper examines how a group of Hong Kong working mothers use the internet in performing and realizing their paid work and domestic role identities. The internet is a technology-enabled space and also what Michel de Certeau calls a ‘practiced place’, where its nature and functions are necessarily determined by the actions and practices of agents. Through participant observation and the analysis of a sample of chatroom and forum messages from a user-driven Hong Kong-based parenting website called Happy Land, I examine the relationship between this virtual space and its users. I find that the website has developed beyond its technology-mediated nature into a community of face-to-face friendships and social and emotional support. In effect, this virtual space plays a role in the social reproduction of the contemporary dual-earner family by enabling working mothers who use the website to perform roles in production and reproduction respectively.     

Book reviews

Australian Books

A. T. Yarwood: Attitudes to Non‐European Immigration (Problems in Australian History), Cassell, Melbourne, 1968, pp. 146, $2.25.

Frank Hardy: The Unlucky Australians, Thomas Nelson, Melbourne, 1968, pp. 249 + index, $4.95 (cloth), $1.95 (paper).

Stanley Brogden: Australia's Two‐Airline Policy, Melbourne University Press, 1968, pp. 235, $5.75.

C. A. Hughes, ed.: Readings in Australian Government, University of Queensland Press, 1968, pp. 504, $6.50.

Jean Spender: Ambassador's Wife, Angus and Robertson. Sydney, 1968, pp. 207, $4.25.

Arthur Huck: The Chinese in Australia, Longmans, Melbourne, 1968, pp. 117, $4.50.

M. Revelman: Sex and Politics in Australia, Publicity Press Books, Adelaide, 1968, pp. 297, $1.35.

J. A. La Nauze, ed.: Alfred Deakin: Federated Australia: Selections from Letters to the Morning Post: 1900–1910, Melbourne University Press, 1968, pp. 314, $7.20.

Overseas Books

Frank Parkin: Middle‐Class Radicalism: The Social Bases of the British Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, Melbourne University Press, 1968, pp. 207 + vii, $4.75.

L. J. Sharpe, ed.: Voting in Cities, Macmillan, London, 1968, pp. 340, $8.80.

The Times News Team: The Black Man in Search of Power, Nelson, London, 1968, pp. 174, $4.95.

J. A. A. Stockwin: The Japanese Socialist Party and Neutralism: A Study of a Political Party and its Foreign Policy, Melbourne University Press, 1968, pp. 197 + x, $6.50.

D. A. Low, ed.: Soundings in Modern South Asian History, Australian National University Press, Canberra, 1968, pp. 399 + viii, $7.50.

Gwendolen M. Carter, Thomas Karis and Newell M. Stulyz: South Africa's Transkei: The Politics of Domestic Colonialism, London, Heinemann, 1967, pp. 184 + viii, $6.70.     

“Sports is Politics”: Swimming (and) Pools in Postcolonial Singapore

Almost immediately after Singapore’s independence in 1965, sports became an agent of social engineering in the creation of the new nation, and the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) government pragmatically used the institution of sports in its nation-building enterprise. Based on an analysis of the speeches and press statements of Singaporean bureaucrats and civil servants from the 1960s to the 1980s, this article investigates the ruling elite’s general perception of sports and regional sporting events, examining how such a perception influenced Singapore’s local governance and strategic thinking in foreign relations. Although scholars have pointed out that sports were prominent in the nationalistic discourses of Singapore and in the projection of Singapore’s international image, little about the history and development of individual sports in Singapore is known. The article argues that swimming was the premier sport of choice for Singapore’s ruling elite in its projects of building bodies and the nation after independence, manifested in the swimming pools that the nascent nation strove to build in the residential estates outside the “colonial stronghold” of the central town district.     

The Great Dog Massacre in Late Qing China: Debates,Perceptions, and Phobia in the Shanghai International Settlement

Modern assessments of a well-known sign in a Shanghai park that stated “Dogs and Chinese Not Admitted” have established that the dog aspect of it was not true, but the sign remains highly visible in the Chinese historiography of Western imperialism. Such reassessments do not seem to recognize that the sign might have meant something considerably different to Chinese and foreigners in late Qing Shanghai than it would have in later periods of modern Chinese history. Dog–human relations had changed through a mix of two processes: dog-keeping as a social practice and the challenges of rabies in the management of urban space. Under the rule of the Shanghai Municipal Council, animals, health, and imperialism converged in the Shanghai International Settlement to destabilize the traditional roles of dogs and introduce modernity through the disciplining of both animal and human bodies and the demarcation and management of new urban spaces.