Andrea E. Pia
2021
Pia, Andrea E.; Previato, Tommaso; Punzi, Valentina; Zoccatelli, Giulia
History of Chinese Anthropology Journal Article
In: 2021.
@article{Pia2021,
title = {History of Chinese Anthropology},
author = {Andrea E. Pia and Tommaso Previato and Valentina Punzi and Giulia Zoccatelli},
year = {2021},
date = {2021-01-01},
urldate = {2021-01-01},
abstract = {2. Chinese Anthropology: Context and Development 2.1. The pre-modern period 2.1. 1. Ethnographic and anthropological notes in the Western literary tradition 2.1. 2. “Ethnographic” sources in pre-modern China 2.1. 3. Reconsidering “classical” Chinese anthropology 2.2. The beginnings of Chinese anthropology: translations and introductions 2.2. 1. Modernization in China 2.2. 2. Translations and Commentaries 2.3. Relation between academic movements and the constitution of the education system 2.3. 1. Anthropology and related teachings: some traces from the curricula 2.3. 2. The generation of repatriated scholars and their contribution to the anthropological cause 2.3. 3. The first field investigations},
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2. Chinese Anthropology: Context and Development 2.1. The pre-modern period 2.1. 1. Ethnographic and anthropological notes in the Western literary tradition 2.1. 2. “Ethnographic” sources in pre-modern China 2.1. 3. Reconsidering “classical” Chinese anthropology 2.2. The beginnings of Chinese anthropology: translations and introductions 2.2. 1. Modernization in China 2.2. 2. Translations and Commentaries 2.3. Relation between academic movements and the constitution of the education system 2.3. 1. Anthropology and related teachings: some traces from the curricula 2.3. 2. The generation of repatriated scholars and their contribution to the anthropological cause 2.3. 3. The first field investigations
2020
Pia, Andrea E.; Batterbury, Simon; Joniak-Lüthi, Agnieszka; LaFlamme, Marcel; Wielander, Gerda; Zerilli, Filippo M; Nolas, Sevasti-Melissa; Schubert, Jon; Loubere, Nicholas; Franceschini, Ivan; Walsh, Casey; Mora, Agathe; Varvantakis, Christos
An Act of Love: Open Access Manifesto for Freedom, Integrity, and Creativity in the Humanities and Interpretive Social Sciences Journal Article
In: Commonplace, vol. 9, no. 2, pp. 7-16, 2020.
@article{Pia2020c,
title = {An Act of Love: Open Access Manifesto for Freedom, Integrity, and Creativity in the Humanities and Interpretive Social Sciences},
author = {Andrea E. Pia and Simon Batterbury and Agnieszka Joniak-Lüthi and Marcel LaFlamme and Gerda Wielander and Filippo M Zerilli and Sevasti-Melissa Nolas and Jon Schubert and Nicholas Loubere and Ivan Franceschini and Casey Walsh and Agathe Mora and Christos Varvantakis},
doi = {10.21428/6ffd8432.a7503356},
year = {2020},
date = {2020-12-31},
urldate = {2020-12-31},
journal = {Commonplace},
volume = {9},
number = {2},
pages = {7-16},
abstract = {Over the next decade, Open Access (OA) is likely to become the default in scholarly publishing. Yet, as commercial publishers develop new models for capturing revenue (and as policy initiatives like Plan S remain reluctant to challenge their centrality), researchers, librarians, and other concerned observers are beginning to articulate a set of values that critically engages the industry-driven project of broadening access to specialist scholarship. While alternative genealogies exist, conversations about OA in the Global North have largely been concerned with the model of the STEM disciplines, lately shifting to focus on the development of infrastructural fixes that transcend traditional journal formats and enforce the openness of research data and protocols. There has been far less discussion about the political implications of labour and value in OA, particularly as they relate to the defence of what we perceive as increasingly imperiled principles of academic freedom, integrity, and creativity. The undersigned are a group of scholar-publishers based in the humanities and social sciences who are questioning the fairness and scientific tenability of a system of scholarly communication dominated by large commercial publishers. With this manifesto we wish to repoliticise Open Access to challenge existing rapacious practices in academic publishing—namely, often invisible and unremunerated labour, toxic hierarchies of academic prestige, and a bureaucratic ethos that stifles experimentation—and to bear witness to the indifference they are predicated upon. In this manifesto we mobilise an extended notion of research output, which encompasses the work of building and maintaining the systems, processes, and relations of production that make scholarship possible. We believe that the humanities and social sciences are too often disengaged from the public and material afterlives of their scholarship. We worry that our fields are sleepwalking into a new phase of control and capitalisation, to include continued corporate extraction of value and transparency requirements designed by managers, entrepreneurs, and politicians.},
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Over the next decade, Open Access (OA) is likely to become the default in scholarly publishing. Yet, as commercial publishers develop new models for capturing revenue (and as policy initiatives like Plan S remain reluctant to challenge their centrality), researchers, librarians, and other concerned observers are beginning to articulate a set of values that critically engages the industry-driven project of broadening access to specialist scholarship. While alternative genealogies exist, conversations about OA in the Global North have largely been concerned with the model of the STEM disciplines, lately shifting to focus on the development of infrastructural fixes that transcend traditional journal formats and enforce the openness of research data and protocols. There has been far less discussion about the political implications of labour and value in OA, particularly as they relate to the defence of what we perceive as increasingly imperiled principles of academic freedom, integrity, and creativity. The undersigned are a group of scholar-publishers based in the humanities and social sciences who are questioning the fairness and scientific tenability of a system of scholarly communication dominated by large commercial publishers. With this manifesto we wish to repoliticise Open Access to challenge existing rapacious practices in academic publishing—namely, often invisible and unremunerated labour, toxic hierarchies of academic prestige, and a bureaucratic ethos that stifles experimentation—and to bear witness to the indifference they are predicated upon. In this manifesto we mobilise an extended notion of research output, which encompasses the work of building and maintaining the systems, processes, and relations of production that make scholarship possible. We believe that the humanities and social sciences are too often disengaged from the public and material afterlives of their scholarship. We worry that our fields are sleepwalking into a new phase of control and capitalisation, to include continued corporate extraction of value and transparency requirements designed by managers, entrepreneurs, and politicians.
Pia, Andrea E.
Jurisprudential massage: legal fictions, radical citizenship and the epistemics of dissent in post-socialist China Journal Article
In: Cultural Anthropology, vol. 4, no. 35, pp. 487-515, 2020, ISSN: 1548-1360.
@article{Pia2020,
title = {Jurisprudential massage: legal fictions, radical citizenship and the epistemics of dissent in post-socialist China},
author = {Andrea E. Pia},
doi = {10.14506/ca35.4.01},
issn = {1548-1360},
year = {2020},
date = {2020-08-17},
urldate = {2020-08-17},
journal = {Cultural Anthropology},
volume = {4},
number = {35},
pages = {487-515},
abstract = {While China leads the global race to high‐tech surveillance, a homegrown low‐tech institution of dissent management is currently experiencing a surprising revival: dispute mediation. Drawing on Confucian and socialist practices of justice, Yunnanese dispute mediators are today considerably innovating the jurisprudential techniques that frame the composition of conflict and the meaning of state laws in dispute settings. Jurisprudential massage is the emic term given to one such technique. Here I show how this technique stands for the deployment of therapeutic analogies and legal fictions with the aim of reorienting the political sensibilities of disputants toward a neo‐paternalistic form of citizenship. Contributing to the anthropology of law and resistance, this article shows how civil dissent cannot only be physically quenched through state coercion and silenced by pervasive surveillance or tactical buyouts but can also be ushered off the political stage by a selective redrawing of the epistemic foundation of legality.
},
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While China leads the global race to high‐tech surveillance, a homegrown low‐tech institution of dissent management is currently experiencing a surprising revival: dispute mediation. Drawing on Confucian and socialist practices of justice, Yunnanese dispute mediators are today considerably innovating the jurisprudential techniques that frame the composition of conflict and the meaning of state laws in dispute settings. Jurisprudential massage is the emic term given to one such technique. Here I show how this technique stands for the deployment of therapeutic analogies and legal fictions with the aim of reorienting the political sensibilities of disputants toward a neo‐paternalistic form of citizenship. Contributing to the anthropology of law and resistance, this article shows how civil dissent cannot only be physically quenched through state coercion and silenced by pervasive surveillance or tactical buyouts but can also be ushered off the political stage by a selective redrawing of the epistemic foundation of legality.
Pia, Andrea E.
Memory leaks: Local histories of cooperation as a solution to water-related cooperation problems Book Chapter
In: pp. 101-120, Routledge, 2020, ISBN: 9781003085102.
@inbook{Pia2020b,
title = {Memory leaks: Local histories of cooperation as a solution to water-related cooperation problems},
author = {Andrea E. Pia},
doi = {10.4324/9781003085102-6},
isbn = {9781003085102},
year = {2020},
date = {2020-05-26},
urldate = {2020-05-26},
pages = {101-120},
publisher = {Routledge},
abstract = {This chapter explores the morality of cooperation in rural China through the lens of water management. The project of putting water to human use presents several problems of coordination and cooperation among different users. The chapter addresses some questions emerging from the study of water-related cooperation problems, especially those developed within the framework provided by Ostrom, through an ethnographic study of water policies and management in Yancong, a water-stressed rural township of northeast Yunnan. Ostrom’s theory of cooperation can be made empirically sounder if integrated with a focus on the symbolic dimension of infrastructure and on the moral narratives people produce in relation to their construction and meaning. The chapter’s attentiveness to local histories allows to investigate the active recuperation and re-articulation by common villagers and local cadres of both the symbolic and material legacy of the Great Leap Forward in the solution of cooperation problems relative to the supply of drinking water and its redistribution in the locale.},
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This chapter explores the morality of cooperation in rural China through the lens of water management. The project of putting water to human use presents several problems of coordination and cooperation among different users. The chapter addresses some questions emerging from the study of water-related cooperation problems, especially those developed within the framework provided by Ostrom, through an ethnographic study of water policies and management in Yancong, a water-stressed rural township of northeast Yunnan. Ostrom’s theory of cooperation can be made empirically sounder if integrated with a focus on the symbolic dimension of infrastructure and on the moral narratives people produce in relation to their construction and meaning. The chapter’s attentiveness to local histories allows to investigate the active recuperation and re-articulation by common villagers and local cadres of both the symbolic and material legacy of the Great Leap Forward in the solution of cooperation problems relative to the supply of drinking water and its redistribution in the locale.
Pia, Andrea E.
Jurisprudential massage: legal fictions, radical citizenship and the epistemics of dissent in post-socialist China Journal Article
In: Cultural Anthropology, vol. 35, no. 4, pp. 487–515-487–515, 2020.
@article{Pia2020d,
title = {Jurisprudential massage: legal fictions, radical citizenship and the epistemics of dissent in post-socialist China},
author = {Andrea E. Pia},
doi = {10.14506/ca35.4.01},
year = {2020},
date = {2020-04-27},
urldate = {2020-04-27},
journal = {Cultural Anthropology},
volume = {35},
number = {4},
pages = {487–515-487–515},
abstract = {While China leads the global race to high-tech surveillance, a homegrown low-tech institution of dissent management is currently experiencing a surprising revival: dispute mediation. Drawing on Confucian and socialist practices of justice, Yunnanese dispute mediators are today considerably innovating the jurisprudential techniques that frame the composition of conflict and the meaning of state laws in dispute settings. Jurisprudential massage is the emic term given to one such technique. Here I show how this technique stands for the deployment of therapeutic analogies and legal fictions with the aim of reorienting the political sensibilities of disputants toward a neo-paternalistic form of citizenship. Contributing to the anthropology of law and resistance, this article shows how civil dissent cannot only be physically quenched through state coercion and silenced by pervasive surveillance or tactical buyouts but can also be ushered off the political stage by a selective redrawing of the epistemic foundation of legality.},
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While China leads the global race to high-tech surveillance, a homegrown low-tech institution of dissent management is currently experiencing a surprising revival: dispute mediation. Drawing on Confucian and socialist practices of justice, Yunnanese dispute mediators are today considerably innovating the jurisprudential techniques that frame the composition of conflict and the meaning of state laws in dispute settings. Jurisprudential massage is the emic term given to one such technique. Here I show how this technique stands for the deployment of therapeutic analogies and legal fictions with the aim of reorienting the political sensibilities of disputants toward a neo-paternalistic form of citizenship. Contributing to the anthropology of law and resistance, this article shows how civil dissent cannot only be physically quenched through state coercion and silenced by pervasive surveillance or tactical buyouts but can also be ushered off the political stage by a selective redrawing of the epistemic foundation of legality.
Pia, Andrea E.
We want everything': a commentary to Pun Ngai's 'The new Chinese working class in struggle'. Journal Article
In: 2020.
@article{Pia0000,
title = {We want everything': a commentary to Pun Ngai's 'The new Chinese working class in struggle'.},
author = {Andrea E. Pia},
year = {2020},
date = {2020-01-01},
urldate = {2020-01-01},
abstract = {Vogliamo Tutto (We Want Everything), the working-class novel symbol of the Italian autonomist Marxism of the 70s, is finally available in Chinese. 1 Penned by Nanni Balestrini (2016 [1971]), an experimental poet linked to the leftist literary movement Neoavanguardia, the novel describes a wave of wildcat strikes and protests in the Turin car factory of FIAT. The book is based on interviews Balestrini conducted between 1968 and 1970 with a worker from Southern Italy, Alfonso Natella, who, like the majority of the hundred thousand migrant workers who made industrialisation possible in post-war northern Italy, had been directly involved in a long season of violent labour unrest commonly known in Italy as the Autunno Caldo (Hot Autumn). At one point in the book, we see Natella’s alter ego taking part to a factory sit-in. What did the FIAT workers want to achieve by direct action and the prolonged withdrawal of their …
},
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Vogliamo Tutto (We Want Everything), the working-class novel symbol of the Italian autonomist Marxism of the 70s, is finally available in Chinese. 1 Penned by Nanni Balestrini (2016 [1971]), an experimental poet linked to the leftist literary movement Neoavanguardia, the novel describes a wave of wildcat strikes and protests in the Turin car factory of FIAT. The book is based on interviews Balestrini conducted between 1968 and 1970 with a worker from Southern Italy, Alfonso Natella, who, like the majority of the hundred thousand migrant workers who made industrialisation possible in post-war northern Italy, had been directly involved in a long season of violent labour unrest commonly known in Italy as the Autunno Caldo (Hot Autumn). At one point in the book, we see Natella’s alter ego taking part to a factory sit-in. What did the FIAT workers want to achieve by direct action and the prolonged withdrawal of their …
Pia, Andrea E.; Batterbury, Simon; Lüthi, Agnieszka Joniak; Flamme, Marcel La; Wielander, Gerda; Zerilli, Filippo M; Nolas, Sevasti-Melissa; Schubert, Jon; Loubere, Nicholas; Franceschini, Ivan; Walsh, Casey; Mora, Agathe; Varvantakis, Christos; Sesé, Guillem Gómez; Branca, Domenico
An act of love. An Open Access Manifesto for Freedom, Integrity, and Creativity in the Humanities and Interpretive Social Sciences Book Chapter
In: vol. 4, no. 2, pp. 157-162, University of Cagliari, 2020.
@inbook{Pia2020e,
title = {An act of love. An Open Access Manifesto for Freedom, Integrity, and Creativity in the Humanities and Interpretive Social Sciences},
author = {Andrea E. Pia and Simon Batterbury and Agnieszka Joniak Lüthi and Marcel La Flamme and Gerda Wielander and Filippo M Zerilli and Sevasti-Melissa Nolas and Jon Schubert and Nicholas Loubere and Ivan Franceschini and Casey Walsh and Agathe Mora and Christos Varvantakis and Guillem Gómez Sesé and Domenico Branca},
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abstract = {Labour of Love. An Open Access Manifesto for Freedom, Integrity, and Creativity in the Humanities and Interpretive Social Sciences, is the result of an LSE Research Infrastructure and Investment–funded workshop entitled Academic Freedom, Academic Integrity and Open Access in the Social Sciences, organised by Andrea E. Pia and held at the London School of Economics on September 9, 2019.
Summary — An act of love. An Open Access Manifesto for Freedom, Integrity and Creativity in the Humanities and Interpretive Social Sciences, is the result of a workshop funded by the LSE Research and Investment Infrastructure, entitled Academic Freedom, Academic Integrity and Open Access in the Social Sciences, organized by Andrea E. Pia and held at the London School of Economics on September 9, 2019.},
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Labour of Love. An Open Access Manifesto for Freedom, Integrity, and Creativity in the Humanities and Interpretive Social Sciences, is the result of an LSE Research Infrastructure and Investment–funded workshop entitled Academic Freedom, Academic Integrity and Open Access in the Social Sciences, organised by Andrea E. Pia and held at the London School of Economics on September 9, 2019.
Summary — An act of love. An Open Access Manifesto for Freedom, Integrity and Creativity in the Humanities and Interpretive Social Sciences, is the result of a workshop funded by the LSE Research and Investment Infrastructure, entitled Academic Freedom, Academic Integrity and Open Access in the Social Sciences, organized by Andrea E. Pia and held at the London School of Economics on September 9, 2019.
Summary — An act of love. An Open Access Manifesto for Freedom, Integrity and Creativity in the Humanities and Interpretive Social Sciences, is the result of a workshop funded by the LSE Research and Investment Infrastructure, entitled Academic Freedom, Academic Integrity and Open Access in the Social Sciences, organized by Andrea E. Pia and held at the London School of Economics on September 9, 2019.
Pia, Andrea E.
Jurisprudential Massage Journal Article
In: Cultural Anthropology, vol. 35, no. 4, pp. 487-515, 2020, ISSN: 1548-1360.
@article{Pia2020f,
title = {Jurisprudential Massage},
author = {Andrea E. Pia},
doi = { 10.14506/ca35.4.01},
issn = {1548-1360},
year = {2020},
date = {2020-01-01},
urldate = {2020-01-01},
journal = { Cultural Anthropology},
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abstract = {You have already been incredibly faithful towards the man. And you have been following all the relevant rules for establishing a co-operative. Now, what you need to do is to try to save your relationship as kin. It is not only about the business you are putting together. You need to understand that respecting the law also means respecting the particular circumstances in which your business partner appears to be. What I ask you to have is another pinch of hope and to fix this. Forget about this mandatory entry payment, put the money up yourself if you must, and go ahead! If you’re not convinced try out the administrative court, see how it goes there. What you need to know is that the result we can get here is in both parties’ interests (liangbian yao baiping). Do not ruin everything here, insulting each other and losing temper. What could you expect from your coop if you establish it on unstable grounds?” This was Master Du at his best. An extremely witty Communist party cadre, he had been, since the beginning of my fieldwork in the rural town seat of Yancong, northeast Yunnan Province, an omnipresent figure of dispute resolution. The dialogue above comes from a particularly stormy session held by Du and two of his assistants in November 2013 at the Village Committee Common Room of Litian, a rural hamlet hidden behind the hazy rice-terraced slopes eastward of Yancong. To my surprise, once Du had concluded his summation, the old man allegedly responsible for defaulting on his financial commitment towards the joint co-op project gave a half-contrived nod and promised he would forgive his ‘unfilial son’(niezi) for bringing him to court.},
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You have already been incredibly faithful towards the man. And you have been following all the relevant rules for establishing a co-operative. Now, what you need to do is to try to save your relationship as kin. It is not only about the business you are putting together. You need to understand that respecting the law also means respecting the particular circumstances in which your business partner appears to be. What I ask you to have is another pinch of hope and to fix this. Forget about this mandatory entry payment, put the money up yourself if you must, and go ahead! If you’re not convinced try out the administrative court, see how it goes there. What you need to know is that the result we can get here is in both parties’ interests (liangbian yao baiping). Do not ruin everything here, insulting each other and losing temper. What could you expect from your coop if you establish it on unstable grounds?” This was Master Du at his best. An extremely witty Communist party cadre, he had been, since the beginning of my fieldwork in the rural town seat of Yancong, northeast Yunnan Province, an omnipresent figure of dispute resolution. The dialogue above comes from a particularly stormy session held by Du and two of his assistants in November 2013 at the Village Committee Common Room of Litian, a rural hamlet hidden behind the hazy rice-terraced slopes eastward of Yancong. To my surprise, once Du had concluded his summation, the old man allegedly responsible for defaulting on his financial commitment towards the joint co-op project gave a half-contrived nod and promised he would forgive his ‘unfilial son’(niezi) for bringing him to court.
Pia, Andrea E.; Batterbury, Simon; Joniak-Lüthi, Agnieszka; LaFlamme, Marcel; Wielander, Gerda; Zerilli, Filippo M; Nolas, Melissa; Schubert, Jon; Loubere, Nicholas; Franceschini, Ivan; Walsh, Casey; Mora, Agathe; Varvantakis, Christos
Labour of Love: an Open Access manifesto for freedom, integrity, and creativity in the humanities and interpretive social sciences Journal Article
In: 2020.
@article{Pia2020g,
title = {Labour of Love: an Open Access manifesto for freedom, integrity, and creativity in the humanities and interpretive social sciences},
author = {Andrea E. Pia and Simon Batterbury and Agnieszka Joniak-Lüthi and Marcel LaFlamme and Gerda Wielander and Filippo M Zerilli and Melissa Nolas and Jon Schubert and Nicholas Loubere and Ivan Franceschini and Casey Walsh and Agathe Mora and Christos Varvantakis},
editor = {Andrea E Pia, Simon Batterbury, Agnieszka Joniak-Lüthi, Marcel LaFlamme, Gerda Wielander, Filippo M Zerilli, Melissa Nolas, Jon Schubert, Nicholas Loubere, Ivan Franceschini, Casey Walsh, Agathe Mora, Christos Varvantakis},
year = {2020},
date = {2020-01-01},
urldate = {2020-01-01},
abstract = {Over the next decade, Open Access (OA) is likely to become the default in scholarly publishing. Yet, as commercial publishers develop new models for capturing revenue (and as policy initiatives like Plan S remain reluctant to challenge their centrality), researchers, librarians, and other concerned observers are beginning to articulate a set of values that critically engages the industry-driven project of broadening access to specialist scholarship. While alternative genealogies exist, conversations about OA in the Global North have largely been concerned with the model of the STEM disciplines, lately shifting to focus on the development of infrastructural fixes that transcend traditional journal formats and enforce the openness of research data and protocols. There has been far less discussion about the political implications of labour and value in OA, particularly as they relate to the defence of what we perceive as increasingly imperiled principles of academic freedom, integrity, and creativity. The undersigned are a group of scholar-publishers based in the humanities and social sciences who are questioning the fairness and scientific tenability of a system of scholarly communication dominated by large commercial publishers. With this manifesto we wish to repoliticise Open Access to challenge existing rapacious practices in academic publishing—namely, often invisible and unremunerated labour, toxic hierarchies of academic prestige, and a bureaucratic ethos that stifles experimentation—and to bear witness to the indifference they are predicated upon. In this manifesto we mobilise an extended notion of research output, which encompasses the work …
},
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Over the next decade, Open Access (OA) is likely to become the default in scholarly publishing. Yet, as commercial publishers develop new models for capturing revenue (and as policy initiatives like Plan S remain reluctant to challenge their centrality), researchers, librarians, and other concerned observers are beginning to articulate a set of values that critically engages the industry-driven project of broadening access to specialist scholarship. While alternative genealogies exist, conversations about OA in the Global North have largely been concerned with the model of the STEM disciplines, lately shifting to focus on the development of infrastructural fixes that transcend traditional journal formats and enforce the openness of research data and protocols. There has been far less discussion about the political implications of labour and value in OA, particularly as they relate to the defence of what we perceive as increasingly imperiled principles of academic freedom, integrity, and creativity. The undersigned are a group of scholar-publishers based in the humanities and social sciences who are questioning the fairness and scientific tenability of a system of scholarly communication dominated by large commercial publishers. With this manifesto we wish to repoliticise Open Access to challenge existing rapacious practices in academic publishing—namely, often invisible and unremunerated labour, toxic hierarchies of academic prestige, and a bureaucratic ethos that stifles experimentation—and to bear witness to the indifference they are predicated upon. In this manifesto we mobilise an extended notion of research output, which encompasses the work …
2018
Pia, Andrea E.
As ‘techno-politics’ holds sway, is a water commons possible in China? Book Chapter
In: London School of Economics and Political Science, 2018.
@inbook{Pia2018,
title = {As ‘techno-politics’ holds sway, is a water commons possible in China?},
author = {Andrea E. Pia},
year = {2018},
date = {2018-11-22},
urldate = {2018-11-22},
publisher = {London School of Economics and Political Science},
abstract = {So far the debate about China’s current environmental issues has given little consideration to already existing popular alternatives to the top-down, growth-compatible governance of the country’s endangered natural resources. Forty years of Party-sanctified insistence on pursuing relentless economic development has seemingly muffled the few dissenting voices and suppressed alternative discourses in natural resource management — such as those concerned with stewardship, care, maintenance, or even rejuvenation of the Chinese environment.},
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So far the debate about China’s current environmental issues has given little consideration to already existing popular alternatives to the top-down, growth-compatible governance of the country’s endangered natural resources. Forty years of Party-sanctified insistence on pursuing relentless economic development has seemingly muffled the few dissenting voices and suppressed alternative discourses in natural resource management — such as those concerned with stewardship, care, maintenance, or even rejuvenation of the Chinese environment.
Pia, Andrea E.
Ghosts in the shell: the promises of water users’ associations and the afterlife of Ostrom’s Theory of Cooperation in rural China Bachelor Thesis
2018.
@bachelorthesis{Pia2018b,
title = {Ghosts in the shell: the promises of water users’ associations and the afterlife of Ostrom’s Theory of Cooperation in rural China},
author = {Andrea E. Pia},
year = {2018},
date = {2018-01-01},
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abstract = {Ghosts in the shell: the promises of water users’ associations and the afterlife of Ostrom’s Theory of Cooperation in rural China - LSE Research Online Cookies? Library Header Image Home Browse About Advanced Search Login Ghosts in the shell: the promises of water users’ associations and the afterlife of Ostrom’s Theory of Cooperation in rural China Pia, Andrea E. (2018) Ghosts in the shell: the promises of water users’ associations and the afterlife of Ostrom’s Theory of Cooperation in rural China. In: POLLEN: Political Ecology Network 2018 Biennial Conference, 2018-06-20 - 2018-06-22, Oslo Metropolitan University. Full text not available from this repository. Author Item Type: Conference or Workshop Item (Paper) Official URL: https://politicalecologynetwork.org/pollen-biannua... Additional Information: © 2018 The Author Divisions: Anthropology Subjects: G Geography. },
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Ghosts in the shell: the promises of water users’ associations and the afterlife of Ostrom’s Theory of Cooperation in rural China - LSE Research Online Cookies? Library Header Image Home Browse About Advanced Search Login Ghosts in the shell: the promises of water users’ associations and the afterlife of Ostrom’s Theory of Cooperation in rural China Pia, Andrea E. (2018) Ghosts in the shell: the promises of water users’ associations and the afterlife of Ostrom’s Theory of Cooperation in rural China. In: POLLEN: Political Ecology Network 2018 Biennial Conference, 2018-06-20 - 2018-06-22, Oslo Metropolitan University. Full text not available from this repository. Author Item Type: Conference or Workshop Item (Paper) Official URL: https://politicalecologynetwork.org/pollen-biannua... Additional Information: © 2018 The Author Divisions: Anthropology Subjects: G Geography.
2017
Pia, Andrea E.
A Water Commons in China? Journal Article
In: Made in China Journal, vol. 2, 2017.
@article{Pia2017b,
title = {A Water Commons in China?},
author = {Andrea E. Pia},
doi = {10.22459/MIC.02.02.2017.05},
year = {2017},
date = {2017-06-01},
urldate = {2017-06-01},
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Pia, Andrea E.
Back on the water margin: the ethical fixes of sustainable water provisions in rural China Journal Article
In: Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, vol. 23, no. 1, pp. 120-136, 2017.
@article{Pia2017,
title = {Back on the water margin: the ethical fixes of sustainable water provisions in rural China},
author = {Andrea E. Pia},
year = {2017},
date = {2017-03-01},
urldate = {2017-03-01},
journal = {Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute},
volume = {23},
number = {1},
pages = {120-136},
abstract = {The classical Chinese novel The water margin tells the story of a group of petty officials who take a collective stance against the widespread corruption and unfairness of imperial Chinese society. At the root of this story lies the deeply ethical conundrum of redressing injustice when unchecked power prevails. This article draws from this insight to explore some of the ethical dilemmas Chinese state bureaucrats in Yunnan face today when provisioning drinking water to rural communities. Yunnanese officials are burdened with these dilemmas by the state's conspicuous retreat from rural public services in favour of market‐based supply. Through their ethical interventions, Chinese bureaucrats are able to temporarily defer the collapsing of rural water provisions which is caused by the contradictions introduced by the marketization of water. However, such interventions may be followed by further damage to the environment.
},
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pubstate = {published},
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}
The classical Chinese novel The water margin tells the story of a group of petty officials who take a collective stance against the widespread corruption and unfairness of imperial Chinese society. At the root of this story lies the deeply ethical conundrum of redressing injustice when unchecked power prevails. This article draws from this insight to explore some of the ethical dilemmas Chinese state bureaucrats in Yunnan face today when provisioning drinking water to rural communities. Yunnanese officials are burdened with these dilemmas by the state's conspicuous retreat from rural public services in favour of market‐based supply. Through their ethical interventions, Chinese bureaucrats are able to temporarily defer the collapsing of rural water provisions which is caused by the contradictions introduced by the marketization of water. However, such interventions may be followed by further damage to the environment.
2016
Pia, Andrea E.
“We Follow Reason, Not the Law:” Disavowing the Law in Rural China Journal Article
In: PoLAR: Political and Legal Anthropology Review, vol. 39, no. 2, pp. 276-293, 2016.
@article{Pia2016,
title = {“We Follow Reason, Not the Law:” Disavowing the Law in Rural China},
author = {Andrea E. Pia},
year = {2016},
date = {2016-11-01},
urldate = {2016-11-01},
journal = {PoLAR: Political and Legal Anthropology Review},
volume = {39},
number = {2},
pages = {276-293},
abstract = {Recent debates about the moral climate in China have focused on its citizens’ purported loss of traditional values and interest in the public good. Chinese society, particularly in the countryside, is described in terms of a moral vacuum: the absence of shared values through which citizens’ public behavior might contribute to the nation's greater good. The Chinese state is reforming its judicial system with the aim of making it more accessible to its citizenry, so that law and legal rights create bonds between individuals and the collectivity. This approach envisions legal mediation as a vehicle to bring law to the countryside. This article, however, shows that in rural Yunnan, the law and legal rights are seen as instruments of disenfranchisement. This article demonstrates that Yunnanese rural society is better described as a moral “plenum” than as a “vacuum.” It also shows that Chinese law, via temporary use rights to local …
},
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Recent debates about the moral climate in China have focused on its citizens’ purported loss of traditional values and interest in the public good. Chinese society, particularly in the countryside, is described in terms of a moral vacuum: the absence of shared values through which citizens’ public behavior might contribute to the nation's greater good. The Chinese state is reforming its judicial system with the aim of making it more accessible to its citizenry, so that law and legal rights create bonds between individuals and the collectivity. This approach envisions legal mediation as a vehicle to bring law to the countryside. This article, however, shows that in rural Yunnan, the law and legal rights are seen as instruments of disenfranchisement. This article demonstrates that Yunnanese rural society is better described as a moral “plenum” than as a “vacuum.” It also shows that Chinese law, via temporary use rights to local …
Pia, Andrea E.
On Chinese Pedagogical Legalism (and Its Anthropological Ghost)# Fictions Book Chapter
In: vol. 5, Allegra Lab, 2016.
@inbook{Pia2016b,
title = {On Chinese Pedagogical Legalism (and Its Anthropological Ghost)# Fictions},
author = {Andrea E. Pia},
year = {2016},
date = {2016-05-01},
urldate = {2016-05-01},
volume = {5},
publisher = {Allegra Lab},
abstract = {“You have already been incredibly faithful towards the man. And you have been following all the relevant rules for establishing a co-operative. Now, what you need to do is to try to save your relationship as kin. It is not only about the business you are putting together. You need to understand that respecting the law also means respecting the particular circumstances in which your business partner appears to be. What I ask you to have is another pinch of faith and to fix this. Forget about this mandatory entry payment, put the money up yourself if you must, and go ahead! If you’re not convinced try out the administrative court, see how it goes there. What I need to tell you is that the result we can get here is in both parties’ interests. Do not ruin everything here, insulting each other and losing temper. What could you expect from your co-op if you establish it on unstable grounds?”
This was Master Du at his best. An extremely witty, vastly respected Yunnanese speaking party cadres who had been, throughout my fieldwork in South-West China, an omnipresent figure of extrajudicial dispute resolution. Once he had finished, the old man allegedly responsible of defaulting on his financial commitment towards a joint co-op project gave a contrived nod and promised he would pay his dues. In turn, the opposing party, who only a minute before was vehemently rejecting any possibility of reconciliation, promised he would not press charges. That day I was asked by Master Du to keep him company as he went through a long day of “mediation”(tiaojie gongzuo).},
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“You have already been incredibly faithful towards the man. And you have been following all the relevant rules for establishing a co-operative. Now, what you need to do is to try to save your relationship as kin. It is not only about the business you are putting together. You need to understand that respecting the law also means respecting the particular circumstances in which your business partner appears to be. What I ask you to have is another pinch of faith and to fix this. Forget about this mandatory entry payment, put the money up yourself if you must, and go ahead! If you’re not convinced try out the administrative court, see how it goes there. What I need to tell you is that the result we can get here is in both parties’ interests. Do not ruin everything here, insulting each other and losing temper. What could you expect from your co-op if you establish it on unstable grounds?”
This was Master Du at his best. An extremely witty, vastly respected Yunnanese speaking party cadres who had been, throughout my fieldwork in South-West China, an omnipresent figure of extrajudicial dispute resolution. Once he had finished, the old man allegedly responsible of defaulting on his financial commitment towards a joint co-op project gave a contrived nod and promised he would pay his dues. In turn, the opposing party, who only a minute before was vehemently rejecting any possibility of reconciliation, promised he would not press charges. That day I was asked by Master Du to keep him company as he went through a long day of “mediation”(tiaojie gongzuo).
This was Master Du at his best. An extremely witty, vastly respected Yunnanese speaking party cadres who had been, throughout my fieldwork in South-West China, an omnipresent figure of extrajudicial dispute resolution. Once he had finished, the old man allegedly responsible of defaulting on his financial commitment towards a joint co-op project gave a contrived nod and promised he would pay his dues. In turn, the opposing party, who only a minute before was vehemently rejecting any possibility of reconciliation, promised he would not press charges. That day I was asked by Master Du to keep him company as he went through a long day of “mediation”(tiaojie gongzuo).
2015
Pia, Andrea E.
The vanishing margin: an ethnography of state water provisions in the environmentally degraded Chinese countryside PhD Thesis
2015.
@phdthesis{Pia2015,
title = {The vanishing margin: an ethnography of state water provisions in the environmentally degraded Chinese countryside},
author = {Andrea E. Pia},
year = {2015},
date = {2015-03-01},
urldate = {2015-03-01},
abstract = {Based on 16 months of ethnographic fieldwork between September 2011 and December 2013 in rural Yunnan, this dissertation explores the political and technical project of making water available to human use in a time of drought and environmental stress. In particular, it focuses on the collective challenge undertaken by people in this part of China to keep the water flowing through their land and their communities against many and diverse odds. The main questions it addresses are: How is water shortage experienced and confronted by Chinese citizens? How is water circulated among different people and what kind of cultural practices and institutions do they create in the attempt to meet this very basic human need? What kind of social relationships and relationships with the environment ensue from this attempt? What does it take to keep the water flowing in present day, environmentally degraded rural China? The overarching argument of the dissertation is that if fresh water still remains available in north-eastern Yunnan, this is not solely thanks to State policies or to the rational strategies adopted by public and private entities, but more significantly to the commitment of ordinary villagers and local officials who are doing their best to keep flourishing in what has now become a water-poor area. Because water keeps running thanks largely to the technical knowledge and dedication of ordinary people, it can be said that its management has a human dimension. Relationships of care and dependence, but also of mistrust and antagonism, are implicated in the active project of distributing and allocating fresh water for human use, inflecting the modalities and direction of its course. Securing water for human consumption is, above all else, a cooperative project: one pursued by people who are differently positioned across the social spectrum. By committing to this project, they also tighten and sustain human relationships, and envision the possibilities of a differently organised society in which water could be available to all.},
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Based on 16 months of ethnographic fieldwork between September 2011 and December 2013 in rural Yunnan, this dissertation explores the political and technical project of making water available to human use in a time of drought and environmental stress. In particular, it focuses on the collective challenge undertaken by people in this part of China to keep the water flowing through their land and their communities against many and diverse odds. The main questions it addresses are: How is water shortage experienced and confronted by Chinese citizens? How is water circulated among different people and what kind of cultural practices and institutions do they create in the attempt to meet this very basic human need? What kind of social relationships and relationships with the environment ensue from this attempt? What does it take to keep the water flowing in present day, environmentally degraded rural China? The overarching argument of the dissertation is that if fresh water still remains available in north-eastern Yunnan, this is not solely thanks to State policies or to the rational strategies adopted by public and private entities, but more significantly to the commitment of ordinary villagers and local officials who are doing their best to keep flourishing in what has now become a water-poor area. Because water keeps running thanks largely to the technical knowledge and dedication of ordinary people, it can be said that its management has a human dimension. Relationships of care and dependence, but also of mistrust and antagonism, are implicated in the active project of distributing and allocating fresh water for human use, inflecting the modalities and direction of its course. Securing water for human consumption is, above all else, a cooperative project: one pursued by people who are differently positioned across the social spectrum. By committing to this project, they also tighten and sustain human relationships, and envision the possibilities of a differently organised society in which water could be available to all.
Pia, Andrea E.; Keyzer, Maïka De; Guatam, Nabaraj; Trigo, Yolanda Cristina M; Narchi, Nemer Narchi; Watanabe, Shigeo; Farrell, Katharine N; Almodovar, Vicente Cendrero; Pemán, Miguel Laborda; Berasain, José Miguel Lana; Pratap, Dinesh; Autoros, Hannu; Teruk,; Kurimoto, Shuji; Harada, Sadao; Hayasaka, Keizo; de Moor, Tine; Larsson, Jesper; Teshale, Fekadu Tarekegne; Pereira, Joana Dias; Ojanen, Maria; Mshale, Baruani; Nieto, Sue Helen; Durey, Louis; Miller, Daniel C; Mwangroof, Esther; Gilli,; Berkes, Fikret; Johnson, Derek; Lázaro, Marila; Medeiros, Rodrigo P; Plummer, Ryan; Tipyan, Chananchida; Mee-Udon, Farung; Goetter, Johanna; Neudert, Regina; Salas, Maria Angelica O
All We Are is Dust in the Wind: The Constant Threat of Sand Drifts Journal Article
In: 2015.
@article{Pia2015b,
title = {All We Are is Dust in the Wind: The Constant Threat of Sand Drifts},
author = {Andrea E. Pia and Maïka De Keyzer and Nabaraj Guatam and Yolanda Cristina M Trigo and Nemer Narchi Narchi and Shigeo Watanabe and Katharine N Farrell and Vicente Cendrero Almodovar and Miguel Laborda Pemán and José Miguel Lana Berasain and Dinesh Pratap and Hannu Autoros and Teruk and Shuji Kurimoto and Sadao Harada and Keizo Hayasaka and Tine de Moor and Jesper Larsson and Fekadu Tarekegne Teshale and Joana Dias Pereira and Maria Ojanen and Baruani Mshale and Sue Helen Nieto and Louis Durey and Daniel C Miller and Esther Mwangroof and Gilli and Fikret Berkes and Derek Johnson and Marila Lázaro and Rodrigo P Medeiros and Ryan Plummer and Chananchida Tipyan and Farung Mee-Udon and Johanna Goetter and Regina Neudert and Maria Angelica O Salas},
year = {2015},
date = {2015-01-01},
urldate = {2015-01-01},
abstract = {Practically every Pre-modern society experiences a sort of risk or natural hazard. Even in the moderate climate zone of Europe natural hazards such as floods, storm surges and sand drifts threatened entire societies and could eradicate occupation and exploitation in a region. Some societies, however, were able to withstand such hazards and reduce them to natural events, while others were unable to mitigate such shocks and suffered from the disaster that followed. The question therefore remains, why some societies were able to cope and create subcultures of disaster, while others could not. By looking at the late medieval Campine area, located in the cover sand belt that was prone to produce sand drifts, I will advance that we have to look in to the institutional arrangements, property structures, power balances and commercial strategies to understand why a region was able to succeed in a region of risk.},
keywords = {},
pubstate = {published},
tppubtype = {article}
}
Practically every Pre-modern society experiences a sort of risk or natural hazard. Even in the moderate climate zone of Europe natural hazards such as floods, storm surges and sand drifts threatened entire societies and could eradicate occupation and exploitation in a region. Some societies, however, were able to withstand such hazards and reduce them to natural events, while others were unable to mitigate such shocks and suffered from the disaster that followed. The question therefore remains, why some societies were able to cope and create subcultures of disaster, while others could not. By looking at the late medieval Campine area, located in the cover sand belt that was prone to produce sand drifts, I will advance that we have to look in to the institutional arrangements, property structures, power balances and commercial strategies to understand why a region was able to succeed in a region of risk.
2014
Pia, Andrea E.
History of Chinese Anthropology Book
Seid Editori, 2014, ISBN: 9788889473481.
@book{Pia2014,
title = {History of Chinese Anthropology},
author = {Andrea E. Pia},
isbn = {9788889473481},
year = {2014},
date = {2014-01-01},
urldate = {2014-01-01},
number = {296},
publisher = {Seid Editori},
series = {Anthropology},
abstract = {History of Chinese anthropology: There is a revolution that is taking place before our eyes: the ascent of the People's Republic of China towards the empyrean of the world superpowers. In the daily life of an increasing number of people, this rise is evident in consumption, in work relationships and in travel destinations. We meet China every day, but we know little about it. Many ignore its heterogeneous culture, popular customs and the irreversible effects that an astonishing economic development is having on them. To understand today's China it is necessary to know deeply the process of national and cultural formation, the way in which modernity was built in this country. Similarly to what happened during the industrialization in Europe process guided by new ideas about society and its development - a crucial part in this national training course in China has been covered by anthropology. A new discipline, imported from the West, but which immediately found vast interest in this country due to its comparative scope and its ability to identify structural phenomena in transition societies. Phenomena that if known could be directed and modified. Hu Hongbao, Zhang Haiyang and Wang Jianmin guide us to discover the advent of anthropological thought in China, tracing its historical antecedents, identifying the reasons for its success and providing a detailed picture of the institutionalization of this discipline ... anthropology. A new discipline, imported from the West, but which immediately found vast interest in this country due to its comparative scope and its ability to identify structural phenomena in transition societies. Phenomena that if known could be directed and modified. Hu Hongbao, Zhang Haiyang and Wang Jianmin guide us to discover the advent of anthropological thought in China, tracing its historical antecedents, identifying the reasons for its success and providing a detailed picture of the institutionalization of this discipline ... anthropology. A new discipline, imported from the West, but which immediately found vast interest in this country due to its comparative scope and its ability to identify structural phenomena in transition societies. Phenomena that if known could be directed and modified. Hu Hongbao, Zhang Haiyang and Wang Jianmin guide us to discover the advent of anthropological thought in China, tracing its historical antecedents, identifying the reasons for its success and providing a detailed picture of the institutionalization of this discipline ... Phenomena that if known could be directed and modified. Hu Hongbao, Zhang Haiyang and Wang Jianmin guide us to discover the advent of anthropological thought in China, tracing its historical antecedents, identifying the reasons for its success and providing a detailed picture of the institutionalization of this discipline ... Phenomena that if known could be directed and modified. Hu Hongbao, Zhang Haiyang and Wang Jianmin guide us to discover the advent of anthropological thought in China, tracing its historical antecedents, identifying the reasons for its success and providing a detailed picture of the institutionalization of this discipline ...
},
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History of Chinese anthropology: There is a revolution that is taking place before our eyes: the ascent of the People's Republic of China towards the empyrean of the world superpowers. In the daily life of an increasing number of people, this rise is evident in consumption, in work relationships and in travel destinations. We meet China every day, but we know little about it. Many ignore its heterogeneous culture, popular customs and the irreversible effects that an astonishing economic development is having on them. To understand today's China it is necessary to know deeply the process of national and cultural formation, the way in which modernity was built in this country. Similarly to what happened during the industrialization in Europe process guided by new ideas about society and its development - a crucial part in this national training course in China has been covered by anthropology. A new discipline, imported from the West, but which immediately found vast interest in this country due to its comparative scope and its ability to identify structural phenomena in transition societies. Phenomena that if known could be directed and modified. Hu Hongbao, Zhang Haiyang and Wang Jianmin guide us to discover the advent of anthropological thought in China, tracing its historical antecedents, identifying the reasons for its success and providing a detailed picture of the institutionalization of this discipline ... anthropology. A new discipline, imported from the West, but which immediately found vast interest in this country due to its comparative scope and its ability to identify structural phenomena in transition societies. Phenomena that if known could be directed and modified. Hu Hongbao, Zhang Haiyang and Wang Jianmin guide us to discover the advent of anthropological thought in China, tracing its historical antecedents, identifying the reasons for its success and providing a detailed picture of the institutionalization of this discipline ... anthropology. A new discipline, imported from the West, but which immediately found vast interest in this country due to its comparative scope and its ability to identify structural phenomena in transition societies. Phenomena that if known could be directed and modified. Hu Hongbao, Zhang Haiyang and Wang Jianmin guide us to discover the advent of anthropological thought in China, tracing its historical antecedents, identifying the reasons for its success and providing a detailed picture of the institutionalization of this discipline ... Phenomena that if known could be directed and modified. Hu Hongbao, Zhang Haiyang and Wang Jianmin guide us to discover the advent of anthropological thought in China, tracing its historical antecedents, identifying the reasons for its success and providing a detailed picture of the institutionalization of this discipline ... Phenomena that if known could be directed and modified. Hu Hongbao, Zhang Haiyang and Wang Jianmin guide us to discover the advent of anthropological thought in China, tracing its historical antecedents, identifying the reasons for its success and providing a detailed picture of the institutionalization of this discipline ...
Pia, Andrea E.; Hongbao, Hu; Jianmin, Wang; Haiyang, Zhang
History of Chinese anthropology Book Chapter
In: Are, 2014.
@inbook{Pia2014b,
title = {History of Chinese anthropology},
author = {Andrea E. Pia and Hu Hongbao and Wang Jianmin and Zhang Haiyang},
year = {2014},
date = {2014-01-01},
urldate = {2014-01-01},
publisher = {Are},
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2011
Pia, Andrea E.
On a Ridge between Fields: Unpacking property in land in Qing China Journal Article
In: Ricerca Folklorica, pp. 141-156, 2011.
@article{Pia2011,
title = {On a Ridge between Fields: Unpacking property in land in Qing China},
author = {Andrea E. Pia},
year = {2011},
date = {2011-10-01},
urldate = {2011-10-01},
journal = {Ricerca Folklorica},
pages = {141-156},
abstract = {This paper attempts to unpack the concept of property rights in land in Qing China (1644-1912). Starting from the traditional anthropological approach which sees property rights as a 'bundle' of social relations, this paper addresses the question of how property in land was realized in Qing China. By using extensively historical material against recent anthropological analysis in the study of law, this paper seeks to break up the social concept of property into two moments: (i) the generation of'right' from context dependant modes of agricultural production and (ii) the negotiation of those 'rights' and obligations by local elites and institutional officials in light of their conflicting or convergent interests. This particular approach exposes the concept of property rights to a set of environmental, historical and political variables. At the same time, it suggests that our present interpretation of the arrangement of land property in Qing China is profoundly influenced by the theoretical debates in which the concept of property has been employed. Insofar as the 'economical' and 'institutional' approaches found in the literature employ historically 'thick' concept such as 'right', 'law' and 'value' without accounting for cultural and sociological variations, they fail to provide the basis for a contextsensitive explanation of the production of 'property relations'. To this end, this paper presents a patchwork narrative of the generation, negotiation, codification and interpretation of land rights during the Qing with the aim of understanding the critical moments in the production of property; of highlighting the interplay of different social actors in its realization; and, finally, of problematizing the academic debate on its content.},
keywords = {},
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This paper attempts to unpack the concept of property rights in land in Qing China (1644-1912). Starting from the traditional anthropological approach which sees property rights as a 'bundle' of social relations, this paper addresses the question of how property in land was realized in Qing China. By using extensively historical material against recent anthropological analysis in the study of law, this paper seeks to break up the social concept of property into two moments: (i) the generation of'right' from context dependant modes of agricultural production and (ii) the negotiation of those 'rights' and obligations by local elites and institutional officials in light of their conflicting or convergent interests. This particular approach exposes the concept of property rights to a set of environmental, historical and political variables. At the same time, it suggests that our present interpretation of the arrangement of land property in Qing China is profoundly influenced by the theoretical debates in which the concept of property has been employed. Insofar as the 'economical' and 'institutional' approaches found in the literature employ historically 'thick' concept such as 'right', 'law' and 'value' without accounting for cultural and sociological variations, they fail to provide the basis for a contextsensitive explanation of the production of 'property relations'. To this end, this paper presents a patchwork narrative of the generation, negotiation, codification and interpretation of land rights during the Qing with the aim of understanding the critical moments in the production of property; of highlighting the interplay of different social actors in its realization; and, finally, of problematizing the academic debate on its content.
2007
Pia, Andrea E.
"Hanzai jiushi deng xia yu" Drought, only rain is expected. Social risk construction in a rural Chinese village Book Chapter
In: Foscari University of Venice, 2007.
@inbook{Pia2007,
title = {"Hanzai jiushi deng xia yu" Drought, only rain is expected. Social risk construction in a rural Chinese village},
author = {Andrea E. Pia},
year = {2007},
date = {2007-01-01},
urldate = {2007-01-01},
journal = {Ca 'Foscari University of Venice},
publisher = {Foscari University of Venice},
abstract = {Although considered a simple natural phenomenon whose consequences are commonly considered inevitable, an ethnographic approach to the drought phenomenon raises many doubts about this interpretation. Through a field study lasting a total of six months, spent in a rural village belonging to the district of Mentougou, a municipality of Beijing, this thesis places drought in relation to the social context and to the water resources management policies implemented in the area. By breaking down the environmental risk management processes and analyzing them on the basis of the asymmetrical allocation of the drought risk, it is argued that economic policy decisions regarding the management of water resources cannot be excluded from the year of the factors making up the drought risk itself.},
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Although considered a simple natural phenomenon whose consequences are commonly considered inevitable, an ethnographic approach to the drought phenomenon raises many doubts about this interpretation. Through a field study lasting a total of six months, spent in a rural village belonging to the district of Mentougou, a municipality of Beijing, this thesis places drought in relation to the social context and to the water resources management policies implemented in the area. By breaking down the environmental risk management processes and analyzing them on the basis of the asymmetrical allocation of the drought risk, it is argued that economic policy decisions regarding the management of water resources cannot be excluded from the year of the factors making up the drought risk itself.