China, Laos, and Vietnam are three of a handful of late socialist countries where capitalist economics rubs up against party-state politics. In these countries, sweeping processes of change open up new vistas of opportunity and imaginaries of the future alongside much uncertainty and anxiety, especially for their large rural populations.

Contributors to this edited volume demonstrate the diverse ways in which rural people build futures in this unique policy landscape and how their aspirations and desires are articulated as projects involving both citizens and the state. This produces a politics of development that happens through and around the state as people navigate discourses of betterment to imagine and make new futures at individual and collective levels.
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Based on rich case studies, this book explores how people build their futures as they navigate the fast-changing landscape of late socialist Asia, where party-state politics intersects with capitalist economics.
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Acknowledgements List of illustrations Notes on Contributors 1 Rural Life in Late Socialism: Politics of Development and Imaginaries of the Future  Phill Wilcox, Jonathan Rigg and Minh Nguyen 2 Risk Perception and Lowland Rice Farming Change in Savannakhet Province, Southern Laos  Ian G. Baird, Santi Piyadeth and Chanthavisouk Ninchaluene 3 Hmong Christianisation, the Will to Improve and the Question of Neoliberalism in Vietnam’s Highlands  Seb Rumsby 4 Staying or Moving  Government Compliance in Post-Zomian Laos  Guido Sprenger 5 Good Baby, Good Life  Exploring a New Akha Way of Life Free from Abnormal Birth  Ruijing Wang 6 Single Mothers’ Livelihoods in Rural North Central Vietnam: Struggles for a Good Life  Tuan Anh Nguyen, Cam Ly Thi Vo and Binh Minh Thi Vu 7 Rural Schooling and a Good Life in Late Socialist Laos: Articulations, Sketches and Moments of Good Time  Roy Huijsmans and Mr Piti 8 Translocal Households and Family Visions in Contemporary Vietnam: A Neoliberal Shift?  Hy V. Luong 9 Making a Good Life by Building a Good House: A Case Study of Baikou New Village in Southeastern China  Lan Wei 10 A Good Life Postponed: Working in the Countryside, Retiring in the City in Contemporary China  Catrina Schwendener 11 Tradition, Habitat, and Well-Being: Polygamous Marriage in a Tibetan Village  Li Zhi-nong and He Shu-qing Index
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Product details

ISBN
9789004528055
Published
2023
Publisher
Brill
Weight
623 gr
Height
235 mm
Width
155 mm
Thickness
25 mm
Age
P, 06
Language
Product language
Engelsk
Format
Product format
Innbundet

Biographical note

Phill Wilcox is a Research Associate at Bielefeld University, Germany. She is interested in the politics of late socialism and works on the politics of development in Laos and across the global South.

Jonathan Rigg is Professor of Human Geography at the University of Bristol, UK. He is interested in the human dimensions of agrarian change in Asia and has worked in Laos, Thailand, and Vietnam, as well as Nepal and Sri Lanka.

Minh T.N. Nguyen is Professor of Social Anthropology at Bielefeld University, Germany, and Visiting Professor at Vietnam National University in Hanoi. She works on care, welfare, migration, and labour in China, Vietnam and in the Global South more generally.