Beschreibung
Subduing nature and harnessing water resources rose to
become the key paradigm of modernisation in the Mekong
Delta. Over the past 40 years, waterscape engineering turned
Vietnam’s largest river estuary into one of the most
agriculturally productive areas in the world. This book
traces water resources development from the time of the
socialist-oriented hydraulic mission and Green Revolution,
which began in the late 1970s under the economic rationale
of central planning, to more recent trends responding to r
enovation policy, global environmental change and Vietnam’s
capitalist transformation. Analytically, the focus is with
the nexus of water regulation, bureaucratic power and
socio-ecological change, as well as the vested interests and
corresponding strategic actions that coalesce around the
technocratic hydro-management. Going beyond the scope of the
Mekong Delta, the author offers new perspectives and
critical reflections on water governance dynamics and
institutional reforms in Vietnam from both historical and
contemporary perspectives.
Simon Benedikter is a scholar of Southeast
Asian Studies and served as a senior researcher at the
Center for Development Research (ZEF), University of Bonn
(Germany) from 2007 to 2013. Based in the Mekong Delta since
2007, the author has been involved in a wide range of social
science research activities on water governance, rural
development and environmental issues.
