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

Abstract

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.

Beyond state politics in Asia's transboundary rivers: Revisiting two decades of critical hydropolitics

“…Local knowledge was also key to engagements in EIA processes for the Salween. For instance, in the case of Hatgyi Dam, such work resulted in expanding the scope of what and who was included as ‘impacted’ by the project and in project delays (Lamb, 2014; Fung & Lamb, forthcoming ).…”

Clarifying rupture: An authors’ reply

“…As noted earlier, they saw a growing awareness in government that environmental issues intersected broader rights-related questions, producing new and harsh government crackdowns on organizations as well as individual activists – perhaps akin to those observed by Wilmsen and Rogers in the Three Gorges Dam case. Considering this shifting political space, they placed growing importance on the development of long-term networks rather than ‘wins’ in specific campaigns (see also Fung and Lamb, 2023). As one participant shared, ‘for local civil society advocates seeking social and environmental justice, it is now hard to think in terms of success or failure because we are engaged in a long-term struggle’.…”